Taking action

Visual artist Joseph Michael listens as indigenous advocates and researchers discuss the need for all of us to take action to save the plants that are keeping the world – and us – alive!

Benki Piyãko Ashaninka and Araquém Alcântara’s comments have been translated from Portuguese to English.

Questions for discussion

• Antonio Donato Nobre makes a statement in the video, “If we lose the Amazon, we lose Gaia.” What does he mean?

• Matt Hall talks about the importance of plant life. Do you think we can live without plants? What impact would be felt globally if the Amazon forest was no longer living?

• What are your thoughts on the difference between what people think or say and their behaviours? 

• What actions could you take to be an effective global citizen?

Transcript

Mariana Maia

Indigenous Advocate

Eyes are turned towards the Amazon now more than ever before. Suddenly and last year with the fires already, it was huge and all over the world. You know, people are looking more at the Amazon I feel and are caring more about it because it’s under such threat. It’s a special moment, an opportunity, you know, to see if we can actually change things.

Benki Piyãko Ashaninka

Ashaninka Leader, President of Yorenka Tasorentsi Institute

Seeing forests burn down everywhere in the country was a big shock to us. We noticed the weather changing, becoming hotter every day. Temperature inversions are also out of control. We have dramatic cold to hot variances which affect our breathing. Today we are observing a very different moment in history of humankind.

Antonio Donato Nobre

Earth Systems Researcher, National Institute of Amazonian Research

If we have a structure that we respect so much like the intellect, as the apex of, you know, the civilised human and the most sophisticated and powerful development from nature – as we are children of nature, right? – and this structure has acquired the capacity to think in abstract terms, it means it has forgotten its connection with the mother body. I call the mother body, because we also forgot the connection with the mother Earth. 

But when I look at what humanity, as a collective, is doing to Gaia, I see exactly the same phenomenon. Also that, that is people might in their heads think, “Oh yes, we have to do this, we have do to that,” but in their bodies and their behaviours, they are being animals. They’re being instinctive, they are pursuing pleasure, they are enjoying life or trying to enjoy life and not really caring unless something really threatening comes by or threatens them personally or their integrity. Because if we lose the Amazon, we lose Gaia.

Matt Hall

Senior Researcher, The Environmental Law Initiative

Think for a moment, just, just how, you know, what your life would be like without plants. So plants provide all our food, they provide the oxygen in the air that you breathe and they provide fuel and shelter. I mean we are utterly reliant on plant life.

Araquém Alcântara

Photographer

The forest is a society so perfect that we can only celebrate, respect and try to understand. And of course, it is a great laboratory for us to try and have a healthy life on this planet. Without her, there is no future.