Maria Amália Souza, founder of Casa Fund, receives the J. Blanton Belk Award for her contribution to humanity

Maria Amália Souza, founder and Director of Strategic Development of Casa Socio-Environmental Fund, was chosen in 2023 to receive the J. Blanton Belk Outstanding Alumnus/Alumna Award, the highest honor offered by the Up With People International Alumni Association (UWPIAA). The award is dedicated to alumni who have made an outstanding contribution to humanity.

Click here to watch the award ceremony.

Up With People was founded in 1965 by J. Blanton Belk to provide young adults with a unique experience of interacting with the world through positivity and music. Over 22,000 young people have had this experience, which involved a year of traveling the world with an international musical show and engaging in community service experiences. Amália, at 20 years old, visited 5 countries and was hosted by more than 70 families in places where the group performed the show and visited local institutions.

Maria Amália Souza with J. Blanton Belk, founder of Up With People, and his wife Elizabeth (Betty) Belk.

According to Maria Amália, “This unique vision of the world and its people, combined with management, public relations, and human skills, and the understanding of what a big dream can achieve for the world, was a great inspiration to believe that it was also possible to change the way humanity relates to the planet. And above all, to try to change how philanthropy could understand that if we want a world where humans can continue to live, we must rapidly, and on a large scale, change the direction of philanthropic resources as well, to strengthen, protect, and respect the unique role of the guardians of the most biodiverse places on the planet, where the land rests… where the conditions conducive to the preservation of life exist.”

The intention of UWP has always been to bring people together for the common good, regardless of ideology, political affiliation, ethnicity, race, or religious affiliation, offering such a unique and multiple view of the world that it could inspire each individual’s vision for building a better world.

And that is exactly what happened with Amália, a lifetime of complete dedication to creating tools and mechanisms that could enable the engagement and strengthening of the true guardians of the great biomes of South America, and the planet.

Maria Amália Souza and indigenous leader Ailton Krenak in 1989 at the ceremony where Krenak received the Letellier-Moffit Human Rights Award in Washington DC. Photo: Personal Archive.

For 38 years, Maria Amália has been dedicated to designing systemic strategies to ensure that philanthropic resources reach the most excluded and vulnerable grassroots community groups, protectors of some of the most important and biodiverse places on Earth. She has worked with international NGOs, consulted with companies on their social investment evaluations, and collaborated with global networks working on environmental protection, addressing the effects of climate change and how to combat them.

After her year-long experience with Up With People in 1983, with a new global perspective and motivation to serve others, Amália joined World College West in California and earned a degree in International Services, Development and Environmental Studies. During this time, she became acquainted with an incipient global movement organizing to save the most important natural places on the planet, rivers, forests, and many others. It was then that she discovered the indigenous movement in Brazil, through a meeting with Ailton Krenak at a conference in 1986, with whom she started working in the following years.

Amália on the Jordan River, on her way to the land of the Huni Kuin people in 2000, in Acre. Photo: Joseane Daher.

During those years, she was also introduced to the world of philanthropic institutions and noticed the difference in the availability of support for civil organizations in the Global North and the Global South. While these new NGOs grew rapidly in four years, resources for the true guardians of the planet’s major biomes were always scarce or nonexistent. She began to consider how to obtain resources for the indigenous peoples of the Amazon Rainforest, eventually for South America, and currently, as an inspiration for a global movement of local funds for all the major biomes that maintain the planet’s life in balance.

In addition to guiding the strategic development of Casa Fund, Maria Amália is also part of the Board of Directors of AIDA – Inter-American Association for Environmental Defense, she is a member of the Steering Committee of HRFN – Human Rights Funders Network, and involved with The Ocean Foundation. She leads Casa Fund’s engagement in a series of networks and consortia related to the field of international philanthropy, writing articles for magazines and specialized media in this field, as well as giving interviews and providing study guidance. In recent years, Amália has been a highly sought-after speaker at numerous international symposiums.

Maria Amália Souza is dedicated to designing systemic strategies to ensure that philanthropic resources reach the most excluded and vulnerable grassroots community groups. In 2016, she was among the 7 global finalists for the Olga Alexeeva Award for Innovators in Global South Philanthropy.

Her international experience, having visited 60 countries during her professional life, has facilitated her position in global discussions on North/South philanthropy. In these events, she represents Casa Fund and contributes to topics such as the importance of local funds in the Global South and what they add to the established field of philanthropy, the role of protecting community groups in maintaining important biomes that control climate balance, and the impacts of these changes on their lives. Other topics include the protection of environmental defenders’ rights, gender justice, community philanthropy, building philanthropy in Global South countries, among other subjects.

In 2016, Maria Amália was one of the seven global finalists from five different continents (and the only finalist from South America) for the prestigious Olga Alexeeva Memorial Award for Innovation in Philanthropy in the Global South. Olga Alexeeva, founder of the Philanthropy Bridge Network, gained prominence as a leader in her native Russia and later led the portfolio of major individual donors for CAF-Charities Aid Foundation UK. She was considered the inspiration and driving force behind many innovations in the emerging philanthropic sector, where her integrity, values, and passion made her a role model for emerging leaders in the field. Created to celebrate the legacy of its namesake, the award, sponsored by the Alliance Magazine, is given annually by a panel of international judges to an individual “who has demonstrated outstanding leadership, creativity, and results in developing philanthropy for progressive social change in an emerging market country or countries.”

In March 2023, Maria Amália was one of the 16 women honored by the Global Landscapes Forum for her contributions to philanthropy, enabling philanthropic dollars to reach the defenders of the great South American biomes.

To mark the United Nations International Women’s Day, which took place on March 8th this year, the Global Landscapes Forum honored 16 Women Restoring the Earth (2023 Edition), recognizing sixteen women at the forefront of climate and biodiversity crises. These exceptional women represent innovation in science, technology, art, public policy, sustainable business, environmental activism, journalism, litigation, climate finance, international climate treaty negotiations, and local ecosystem restoration worldwide. Maria Amália Souza was one of the honorees due to her significant contributions to the field of philanthropy.

Maria Amália Souza in 2004. Strategic planning meeting for the establishment of Casa Fund. Photo: Personal Archive.

“For decades, we have seen resources allocated to protect large biomes such as the Amazon, Cerrado, or wetlands, going to very large organizations, but it has never been enough to change the scenario of threats, challenges, and devastation in these places, let alone meet the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and climate agreements. The people who protect our forests, lands, and biodiversity are those who have lived there for hundreds and thousands of years. 80% of the standing forests on this planet are on indigenous lands. What more do we need to convince ourselves that they are doing the best job? These people rarely receive investments to protect their lives, livelihoods, and territories. They endure constant aggressions and violence, but they never give up. So, we came up with something different that could reach these people, no matter where they were, no matter how remote.

I quickly realized that to conserve fragile ecosystems, we needed to bring resources to the people who belong to these places; those who are doing the hardest work and doing it best: indigenous groups, riverside communities, and defenders of territorial rights at the forefront of environmental protection; no one can do it better than them.”

Maria Amália Souza

If philanthropy is at the core of her heart, music is at the core of her soul. Amália loves everything related to music – she plays the guitar and piano, and sings admirably. She supports various local music groups and is often found performing at cafes and other music venues in Cunha, a city in the interior of São Paulo where she lives surrounded by the Atlantic Forest. “Maria Amália touched the hearts and souls of each of her Up With People colleagues in 1983, and her efforts continue to inspire us to this day,” say her peers who nominated her for the award. For the compassionate person she is and the incredible work she has done in preserving the future of countless vulnerable communities around the world, Maria Amália Souza is the winner of the 2023 J. Blanton Belk Outstanding Alumna Award.

The award ceremony will take place at the 2023 UWPIAA Reunion on July 21, 2023, in Scottsdale, Arizona.

Congratulations, Maria Amália! The Casa Fund team is proud and delighted for this recognition of your person and your important contribution to the socio-environmental cause.