Yanomami youth turn to drones to observe their Amazon territory

When illegal miners started to penetrate their country seven years ago, many Yanomami felt helpless. How can you monitor an area of ​​Portugal in a remote area of ​​the northern Amazon without a police, planes or technology? Around 20,000 illegal Garimpeiros, as illegal miners are known in Brazil, penetrated the country to look for gold and cassite, which caused a severe humanitarian and ecological crisis.

The Yanomami made several appeals to the Brazilian federal government. Between 2019 and 2022, however, the nation was led by the right-wing extremist President Jair Bolsonaro, who is banned by the Brazilian constitution for mining for indigenous countries under any circumstances. Bolsonaro and his team blocked all efforts to drive out invaders from the country of Yanomami.

In a remote region that borders on Venezuela, the country's largest indigenous territory alone, the Yanomami decided that they were alone to protect their country. In 2022, the Hutukara Yanomami Association (Hay) sought partnerships to implement and organize a project to train people to use drones. Maurício Ye'kwana, director at Hay, began this project in 2021 as a participant in the COP26 Climate Summit in Glasgow. He turned to European donors who decided to support the training initiative by the Cafod of the International Humanitarian organization.

The 32,212 Yanomami and Ye'kwana, an ethnic group that shares the territory, could impossible to watch about about 10 million hectares (24.7 million acres and canoes, but they could see a little further with drones.

“The aim of the course was to train the young Yanomami and to arouse innovations in their thinking so that they can appear as multipliers for other young people,” Maurício told Monabay.

The 26-year-old Cidice Palimitheli was part of a group that completed the advanced training module last September and can now use this equipment in territorial surveillance and surveillance. “I really enjoyed this workshop because I learned more about how to drive the drone and map our territory,” said Palimitheli to Monbabay. “In this third advanced, the new was automatically lifting the drone.”

Palimitheli and his colleagues say that this technology created by non-indigenous technology will help protect the cultural traditions of the ancestors and to strengthen environmental protection in one of the most indigenous areas in Brazil. It is already part of a territorial protection group in a village devastated by invaders. “Now the drone will give me more security to map the communities and to check whether the miners are nearby and they threaten,” he said.

Three personal workshop modules have been held since 2022, with both theoretical and practical classes in the indigenous communities of Yanomami in the state of Roraima, which have been most affected by illegal mining activities in the past seven years.

“I have taken this workshop for two years and have already learned a lot,” said Alexandre Ye'kwana, 24, to Monabay. “For example, I would like to map the mining area and can do it without the teacher. I already know how to create a flight schedule and I have learned more about automated functions. “

The program focuses most of the strongest of illegal mining. In the future, drone monitoring will extend across the entire indigenous area.

New hope

When the left Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva Bolsonaro defeated Bolsonaro as President in 2023, Hope returned to Brazil's indigenous people. The new president promised to drive invaders from local areas and to protect the Amazon rainforest and all Brazilian biomes.

The raids and the support of the Yanomami finally came in 2023. However, it soon became clear that the Yanomami could not only count on government efforts. The illegal miners resisted the territory and many came back after the first raids. Now, two years later, the Yanomami see the success in the eviction efforts, but the challenge remains in the long run. The Federal Government carried out 3,536 raids to remove invaders, which led to a loss of 267 million reais ($ 46.6 million) for organized crime networks involved in the illegal mining in the territory and a reduction in gold mining by 91%.

In order to build the drone program, the Hutukara Association asked for help with the Indigenous Council of Roraima (CIR) to carry out training courses. From 2022 to 2024, three personal workshops were held as a beginner, intermediate and advanced modules.

Giofan Erasmo, an agronomist from the office for territorial, environmental and climate change management at the CIR, is enthusiastic about the results. He represented the partner organization in the mission, which he considered “very successful”. “After studying the advanced module, they teached others how to use drones to take photos of the indigenous territory,” he said to Mons.

Erasmo trained six Yanomami and Ye'kwana, who in turn shared knowledge by training eight other young Yanomami communicators.

“In addition to improving protection, this work helps you to better understand your extensive area and to plan and manage the areas in which your communities are located,” said Erasmo. He added that the use of interactive technologies made learning much easier. Gradually, the pupils to add ideas and suggestions for their practical applicability in their communities.

The mapping flows were specifically requested in the workshops and teaches how to do drones with practical experience and how georeferented photos and videos are produced. Rivers are particularly at risk in the territory, since mercury from the gold mining is the leading pollutant in the Amazon, where 20% of the basic food fish are contaminated.

Erasmo said he saw the results as remarkably positive. “Three years ago, they had no idea about drones or use, and now they have already reached an advanced operating level. From now on you will be able to do specific work for the benefit of your communities, ”he said. According to Erasmo, future training demand is to learn geographical information systems in order to expand your card make -up skills.

Erasmo also said that he believes that the indigenous background of the trainers is the difference in the project. “The perspective of the indigenous people differs from that of non-indigenous people and as” relatives ” [an expression used to designate other people of Indigenous origin, regardless of their specific ethnicity]We talk and understand each other, ”said Erasmo, who belongs to the Makuxi -ethnic group. He explained that Yanomami and Macuxi have similar worldviews despite their cultural peculiarities.

“This partnership is very important and many of your cooperation are extremely useful. “Relatives” get along well so that they can easily learn things from each other, “said Maurídio.

He said Yanomami needed continuous training to monitor the country, since “the government may not be continued forever what is being done today”. “The Yanomami itself has to play a leading role,” he said.

Banner image: Equipped with drones and other technologies, young people from the indigenous country of Yanomami actively monitor their territory, which was exposed to a serious humanitarian and environmental crisis due to the illegal gold and cassite mining. Image with the kind permission of Evilene Paixão/Hay.

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