IRATAPURU EXPERIENCES SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

Amapá extractivists want to sell their products down South

Marco Gonçalves

The left banks of the Jari river show both the failures and the promises of development projects in the Amazon. Beiradão is right there on the river banks, five kilometers of homes on stilts on the water edge. The dwellers are mostly the disinherited children of the first major project encouraged by the military in the seventies - the Jari Project, producer of cellulose, now courting bankruptcy.

An hour and a half upstream from Beiradão there is an on-going experiment which is the opposite of that industrial adventure carried out by the eccentric Daniel Ludwig: RDSRI (the Iratapuru river sustainable development project) - 806,184 hectares of dense tropical forest, created in 1997 by the Amapá state government. It is part of the Sustainable Development Program for the state of Amapá, implemented by governor João Alberto Capiberibe (PSB party). RDSRI combines shared management (government - cooperatives), diversification of extractivism, local production processing and direct commercialization, thus doing away with middlemen. It aims at generating production systems with techniques and scales compatible with the conservation of natural resources. A management board (six members from state agencies and six from the Comaja and Comaru coops which operate in the reserve) is responsible for its management and handling. Six communities inhabit the area and its surroundings, comprising approximately 150 families.

Although experiences cover a vast array of plant species (such as the camu-camu shrub native of the Amazonian marshlands whose fruit is rich in vitamin C, and the rubber tree) the best results thus far have come from the Brazil nut trees. Since 1997 Comaru (mixed cooperative of the Iratapuru river extractivist producers) has been producing nut biscuits in a small plant at the Iratapuru community.

Another byproduct in which the government and the coops invest is Brazil nut oil, of which 252 liters have been processed on an experimental basis.

SPAGHETTI AND SAUSAGE

Brazil nut biscuits supplied to public schools Luana Capobianco:

To process forest raw materials in order to add value to products and, thus, increase the income of traditionally extractivist communities has become a principle of sustainable development in the Amazon. However, to create permanent demand for such products and to overcome the hurdles in the way of reaching consumers are problems which challenge the success of this type of project. RDSRI is no exception to this rule and, thus, the entire Brazil nut biscuit output is being purchased by the Amapá state government to be used as school food, thus ending the spaghetti and sausage lunch, a longtime staple of Brazilian schools.

Comaru secretary Mauro Barbosa says that last year 18 tons of Brazil nut biscuits were produced and sold by the Amapá state government. A few months ago, the same government showed interest in expand its distribution to all municipalities in Amapá. It wants the cooperative to deliver 160 tons this year. To meet such demand, the Comaru coop is putting up a new factory and a storage shed, financed by US$ 209 thousand (US$ 80 thousand from the coop) secured from PD/A, which is a PP-G7 member.

At the same time, the Amapá state government is helping the cooperative to identify business opportunities with Brazil nut producers from other Brazilian states. Recently, businessmen from the southern state of São Paulo traveled upstream in the Jari river in order to know the Iratapuru biscuit-making unit. Mauro Barbosa greeted them and expects to do some business (the biscuits are indeed delicious). However, the Comaru folks know that, in order to win this market, they will have to improve some aspects of production and to invest in adequate packaging.

"We want to sell our products down South and this is why we are investing now. The biscuit-generated income (between R$ 200 and R$ 250 a month) remains minimal", says Barbosa.
marco@socioambiental.org

 

RUBBERTAPPER USES ITALIAN CANTEEN TECHNOLOGY         Rubber made in a spaghetti machine Luana Capobianc   Even as it improves the infrastructure for the production of Brazil nut byproducts, the Iratapuru community invests in a new technology for rubber latex processing. The day we visited RDSRI, some locals were using a procedure to produce rubber through a technique labeled FDL (liquid curing leaf). "This method allows for quicker production and the rubber leaves maintain a higher degree of purity", explains Nivaldo Martins dos Reis, a technician with CNPT-Ibama (national center for the sustainable development of traditional populations). Since traditional curing is replaced by a clotting solution, not only does the product remains residue-free but the rubbertapper is not bothered by all the smoke from the conventional system. This method uses machinery and instruments typical of an Italian eatery, namely, two machines to stretch out pasta and a spaghetti wooden roller. These are used to thin the latex leaf and eliminated from it excessive water and acid from the clotting solution. The stretched leaves dry out in a greenhouse, similar to an oven with drying sticks and hot coals underneath, all covered by a zinc lid. "Another upside is that production can take place in the forest, as long as clean water and the other inputs are available - which is not a problem", says the CNPT technician. INCOME INCREASE The RDSRI rubbertappers are optimist, as they eye a promising market. According to Mauro Barbosa, the reserve can produce 60 yearly tons of rubber (30 kilograms of latex yield 10 kilograms of rubber). The infrastructure implanted in the community has been financed by Funbio funds (R$ 152,000), 60% of which were invested by Comaru. "If the rubbertapper works well, he can produce 10 kg of rubber a day. If he works five hours a day, 25 days a month, he will produce 250 kg, yielding R$ 2.00 per kg. One can make about R$ 500 a month". And people will still have time to plow the land and make biscuits.

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