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Environmental Brigades at University of Colorado Boulder

Environmental Brigades at University of Colorado Boulder

 

May 2015 Panama Journal Entries

Rachael Kaspar

Rachael Kaspar
Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
University of Colorado Boulder

rachael.kaspar@colorado.edu

 

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May 16th-22, 2015

On the way to Panama:

Wow, what a whirlwind! I feel as if we just planned this adventure, however it has been months! Preparations for this trip have been extensive but it has all been enjoyable. After an intense school year of which included the beginning of Global Environmental Brigades, our team is more than excited to begin our brigade. So far, members seem to be most excited about being immersed within a local community in the rainforest. We are anxious to meet our other team members from Penn State to collaborate on our projects. Our projects will be ranging from planting popular native crops including corn, plaintains, and yuca(cassava) within the community of Piriati Embera. Hopefully our practicing of Spanish will be beneificial, as we will be working alongside local community members. Our first day will consist of visiting a local member of the community’s successful model farm. The farmer, Nicolas, will show us the ropes on just how he has been successful in the production of his model farm. We will then participate in three full days of intensive manual labor. The last day, we will present an educational workshop to the local community members on just how important sustainable agriculture is for their livelihood as well as biodiversity and ecosystem services. One of the most important goals for our team is to assess how to have a interactive and fun workshop while intertwining these important concepts into the identity of their culture. Unfortuantely like so many other indigenious cultures, the people of Pirariti Embera have been pressured by modernization and religioius movements resulting in the loss of their culture. Thus, the most important goal is to have a productive workshop while reinforcing to the community that we understand the importance of their cultural identity. These outside pressures, for example the Pan American Highway, have led to an intense increase in deforestation. Although the Pan American Highway has created access to modern education and health care, it has strained native communities to produce a sufficient income. These pressures have led the people of the Embera culture to extensively continue to slash and burn for agriculture. Over a short time, these agricultural plots are depleted of nutrients due to inadequate acidic forest soil and improper land use, creating a lack of resources. These pressures and behaviors create a cycle of low economic income and destruction of rainforest biodiversity and ecosystem stuctures. Our team hopes to empower the people of Piriati Embera to break this vicious cycle and feels fortunate to be apart of empowering the people of Piriati Embera!

Field work:

Monday: The past few days have been awesome. On arrival day, we met up with the other half of our team from Penn State. The individuals within each group range from engineering, physics, business, biology, ecology, and environmental majors. However all are equally contributing 110% within this brigade. The day after we arrived, we headed to Nicholas’s sustainable farm. His farm is absolutely tremendous and extremely inspirational. Not only has he maintained his farm by himself for 28 years, but he is the only farmer that we know of within Panama to practice sustainable farming through the “model farm.” His crops consisted of plaintains, corn, rice, pineapple, yuca(cassava) with gabanana and mango trees spread through out his acreage. He also created a tilapia and iguana livestock. The water from the tilapia pond waters his fragile fruits and vegetables such as peppers, strawberries, and tomatoes. What stuck out to me the most was his drainage and rotation system. Nicholas maintained his crops by creating “natural” barriers on the slope of the mountaineous hillside. When his farm receives heavy rain, the rotting fruits, leaves, and branches fall into the straw/palm blockage. This material decomposes and then is used for organic fertilizer. Nicholas has been so successful that he has promoted eco-tourism and people from all over the world come to see his farm, but unfortunately only a few locals. Later that afternoon, we headed to the indigenious community of Piriti Embrea to meet the Envionmental Committee. They were all extremely welcoming, and even recognized Penn State members from previous years. This recognition made us realize just how much the community welcomes us and continues to support collaboration with us. The first field day was really exciting! We arrived at the community in the morning to see prepared yuca (cassava) and plaintains from the community members ready to plant. Even more so, as the Global Environmental Manager explained to everyone how to plant the crops, community members were jotting down notes and asking many questions. It was a delight to see them so involved in the education as well as working with us in the field. At one point, the President of the Environmental Committee for Piriati noticed me using a machete to cut a bush improperly. She then addressed it to me and showed me the right way. Later on, I noticed that the Environmental President was planting yuca(cassava) wrong, and I showed her the correct way and she expressed sincere gratitude. Although the community members were very expressive in their communication through out the day, these two moments really showed me just how much the project of sustainability goes two ways.

Thursday: We have had an extremely productive week! Together as a whole, we planted an estimated 1400 crops: ~310 plantains, ~468 (yuca)cassava, ~600 corn seeds. When we arrived on the first day to look at the fields, we were all a little intimated. The area seemed overwhelming huge, and although tilled 2 weeks prior, there were a ton of weeds already. However, we collaborated as a fantastic team and finished planting the entire area along with deweeding and using the excessive debris to create barriers every other row. Because we had extra time, we created a drainage system around the fields. The engineers and physics members of our team collaborated to create a proper system in relation to the slope of the terrain. This system allows water to flow around the corn and yuca(cassava) fields and slowly discharge into the future rice paddy field. This was extremely hard work, as we had to dig really deep into feet of solid clay soil. Next brigade, I will be sure to insist that memberswork out before the brigade as well as bring any braces for prior injuries. It was amazing to go out today and see the field planted. Although we received little rain this past week, we received terrential downpours today. This was very exciting, as we were able to see our drainge system work properly. Piriati has actually received very little rain even though it is the beginning of the wet season here. Some of the older community members expressed their belief that our success of planting and the drainage system brought the much needed rain. After we assessed the completion of our project, we started the educational workshop, also known as “charla”. Each team (yuca(cassava), corn, plaintain) created a poster to demonstrate and describe what they exactly did along with what needs to implemented in the future. We tried to keep the words on the posters down to a minimum because even though many of the community members know Spanish, a huge portion of them still only speak Embera and are unable to read or write. We believe our charla was a success, as many of the community members asked a lot of questions and were taking down notes. When we were done, we gave them the posters for reference. It is also comforting to know that our Global Brigades Environmental Manager is in close relation to the community, so any needed guidance can be received from the manager. After lunch, it was time for Piriati to show us their culture. Their leader explained to us their frustrating story with the government and how much it has impacted their lives. For example, he explained to us that although the government told them they would receive running water, electricty, and education 40 years ago, they only received those three necessities just 5 years ago. The women then set up little stations with hand made beautiful trinkets and explained to us just how much time, effort, and passion was put into their creations. Then, they did a few traditional tribal dances and had our entire brigade join in! It was such a blast! Lastly, the women offered juaga tattoos of which are similar to henna. There were so many designs to pick from with each having a meaning behind it. As we left, the Environmental President of the Piriati had tears in her eyes. Hopefully next year we can come back to the same community to further implement the model farm and revisit with all the friends we made at Piriati.

Reflection of Panama:

It’s incredible just how fast a week can go by. We made so many great friends from Penn State and Piriati. At the end of the week, it was great to hear members of our team say, “That was one of the best weeks of my life,” and “I will never forget this experience.” As President, I hope that this experience will live on in each member, every day, no matter where or what their work might entail. I think many people have a hard time with environmental degradation, meaning many feel forced into the negative connotation that we can never recooperate from such distress. It becomes overwhelmingly negative from constant discussion of scientific data that points to the consequences of our destructions. Although it is imperative to remember these facts, it is important to direct these adversaries into a positive future outlook. This positive outlook creates human empowerment to change our destructive behavior into a long-term sustainable and holistic approach which will reduce our impact on the environment. One way to do this is to immerse yourself into empowering a community to be a part of sustainble behavior, such as Piriati. This immersion influences the notion of just how essential it is to remember that within any sustainability project, success does not happen immediately but is progressive through many small achievements. We cannot wait to come back next year to further build off where we, and many other brigades, have left off!

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