The Swiss Blue Community HEKS, the aid organization of the Protestant Church in Switzerland, today held a lunch-cinema, presenting the movie Sempre Viva about the struggle of the flower pickers in the Cerrado, Brazil.
For over 300 years, communities of flower pickers have inhabited the remote forests and hills of Brazil’s Cerrado region, specifically the Serra do Espinhaço. As descendants of escaped African slaves, they survived by remaining as invisible as possible to the Brazilian state. In this seclusion, they have developed their own way of life and economy over the centuries that is perfectly adapted to their environment.
For part of the year, they practise diversified agroecological farming around their settlements. During the dry season, they move to the highlands for a few months, settling in caves and collecting over 100 species of wildflowers known as Sempre-Vivas, which they process with great artistry.
However, their habitat and way of life are under threat from monocultures, mining, and even national parks, where the Brazilian environmental authority prohibits all human economic activity. These protected areas often overlap with land that has been sustainably farmed by flower pickers for generations.
Together with HEKS’s partner organisation, CODECEX, the flower pickers are therefore campaigning for their habitat and their rights as a traditional community.
Following the movie, a small panel including the HEKS Country Coordinator Vicente Puhl and Marilene Alves de Souza (Leninha) discussed the battle for land and water in Brazil. Tomorrow Tuesday, Leninha will give a presentation on water rights in the Brazil state of Minas Gerais at the Swiss Blue Community Eawag (see here), the Federal Aquatic Research Institute, before participating in the Swiss capital and Blue City of Bern in the annual assembly of the Swiss Blue Community.
