{"id":5908,"date":"2023-03-09T11:11:32","date_gmt":"2023-03-09T14:11:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/casa.org.br\/?p=5908"},"modified":"2023-03-09T11:11:32","modified_gmt":"2023-03-09T14:11:32","slug":"maria-amalia-souza-founder-of-casa-socio-environmental-fund-wins-international-recognition-for-global-protection-of-the-environment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/casa.org.br\/en\/maria-amalia-souza-founder-of-casa-socio-environmental-fund-wins-international-recognition-for-global-protection-of-the-environment\/","title":{"rendered":"Maria Am\u00e1lia Souza, founder of Casa Socio-Environmental Fund, wins international recognition for global protection of the environment"},"content":{"rendered":"

Maria Am\u00e1lia Souza founded and co-leads the Casa Socio-Environmental Fund that has granted over US$ 21 million to more than 3,100 projects since 2005 and inspired similar initiatives all around the globe.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

To mark the United Nations\u2019 International Women\u2019s Day (IWD), observed on 8 March, the Global Landscapes Forum (GLF) is honoring 16 women on the frontline of the climate and biodiversity crises<\/a>. These outstanding women are the faces of innovation in science, technology, art, public policy, sustainable business, environmental activism, journalism, litigation, climate finance, international climate treaty negotiations, and grassroots ecosystem restoration across the globe.<\/p>\n

Maria Am\u00e1lia Souza is the only Brazilian woman in this edition of the GLF’s recognition. Other Brazilian leaders, such as the international top model Gisele Bundchen, the indigenous leader and now minister S\u00f4nia Guajajara and the scientist Luciana Gatti were listed in previous years.<\/p>\n

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Maria Am\u00e1lia Souza has dedicated her professional life to designing systemic strategies to ensure that philanthropic resources reach the most excluded and vulnerable community-based groups. In 2016, she was among 7 global finalists for the Olga Alexeeva Memorial Prize for Innovators in Philanthropy from the Global South.<\/p><\/div>\n

“For decades, we’ve seen resources to protect large biomes, such as the Amazon or the wetlands, going to very large organizations, but this was never enough to change the scenario of threats, challenges and devastation of these places, much less\u00a0 reach SDGs and climate agreements. People protecting our forests, lands and biodiversity are people who have been living there for hundreds and thousands of years. 80% of the forests standing on this planet are indigenous lands. What else do we need to convince ourselves that they are doing the best work? These people rarely receive investment to be able to protect their lives, their livelihoods and territories. They\u00a0 suffer constant assaults and violence, yet never give up. So we invented something different that could reach these people anywhere they are, no matter how remote”, she explained during the announcement of the Global\u00a0Landscapes Forum\u00a0event this Wednesday.<\/p>\n

Casa Socio-Environmental Fund that Ms. Souza founded in 2005, funds grassroots organizations working to protect their lands and lives, and also helps forest communities improve their skills to build sustainable solutions for their livelihoods and territories \u2014 for instance, through local fruit and seed-processing businesses, renewable energy in remote regions, etc. And unlike other initiatives that come and go, it is in it for the long haul. For example, the fund has been supporting the Munduruku and other Amazonian communities along the Tapaj\u00f3s river for the past 18 years, funding travel to international Human Rights courts, community consultation meetings and use of national and international legal mechanisms.<\/p>\n

The grants are small but multifaceted; strategically placed to create synergies. \u201cIt is like a process of socio-acupuncture, whereby acting on certain points of the system benefits the whole,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

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Am\u00e1lia on the Jord\u00e3o River, on her way to the land of the Huni Kuin people, in 2000, in Acre. Photo: Joseane Daher<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cI quickly realized that to conserve fragile ecosystems, we needed to get resources to the people who belong there and are doing the toughest job: the Indigenous groups, river communities and land rights advocates at the frontlines of environmental protection; no one can do it better than them,\u201d explains Souza, who has traveled to more than 50 countries to work, learn and share her experience.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe [human beings] are always out there \u2018fighting\u2019 for something, focused on convincing others rather than listening to them. But all great things are achieved by joining forces.\u201d<\/p>\n

The fund that became Souza\u2019s life work is like a hummingbird: nimble and agile. It is hyperconnected; able to respond to unexpected threats to people and biomes and to fund grassroots communities that are too small to be reached by philanthropy behemoths. When Maria Am\u00e1lia Souza left her small hometown in S\u00e3o Paulo state for college in the United States in the 1980s, little did she know she would eventually come back to create the\u00a0 first socio-environmental fund by South Americans, for South Americans.<\/p>\n

Casa Fund, which started two decades ago with five grants, has gone on to deliver 3,000 grants across nine countries, has inspired the creation\u00a0 of 5 new funds in neighboring countries and Africa, and has now led the creation of a global alliance with like-minded initiatives from around the world, the Socio-Environmental Funds of the Global South.<\/p>\n

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Get to know other GLF\u2019s \u201816 Women Restoring the Earth<\/a>\u2019 2023.<\/p>\n