COP30 in the Amazon Has Already Started for the Indigenous Peoples
Distance learning in Pará, with over 50 indigenous peoples, could be the spark to burn down the government’s COP30 dream


The voices of the forest that denounce the destruction of the biomes today also denounce the dismantling of the education system in Pará.
Photo: Walter Kumaruara / @pivide_kumaru.


COP30 in the Amazon has already started for the indigenous peoples that have been mobilized in Belém. They have been occupying the Secretary of Education, as well as blocking roads that cut through their territories, exposing the lack of care of the government of this state, which will soon receive thousands of illustrious visitors in the biggest event dedicated to the global discussion on the climate.
In fact, the theme concerns us all, as we are all subject to flooding, like the recent inundations in São Paulo, or to the never seen before wildfires, such as those that recently terrified California. The governments are disoriented regarding the measures that can equip our cities in the face of the unforeseen events that have occurred from north to south, without the warning that would enable the activation of defense and protection systems.
Entire cities are paralyzed before climate events, and this should interest every one of us, in addition to the governments. Belém is a city disrupted by building sites, which rush to finish the facilities that should receive COP30 — constructions of iron and concrete in the capital, which could be, in itself, a model of florestania, the term that defines the state of citizenship for the peoples of the forest.
Florescidade and florestania are concepts that have appeared based on the experience of decades of organization of extractivist, indigenous, and riparian communities resisting the occupation of the last forests where these populations have their ways of life established.
Organized in regions of Acre, Amazonas, Pará, and Amapá, they succeed in guaranteeing thousands of hectares of areas covered by forests, some demarcated as indigenous lands or Rexex (extractivist reserves), thus ensuring that the local economy sustains the lives of thousands of families inside the forest.
Inspired by the dream of the environmentalist union leader Chico Mendes, the extractivist reserves resist attempts at removal through actions such as research and support of the permanence of their young people in the forest. Offering quality teaching to the new generations is one of the constant demands of these communities. Promoting public policies aimed at health and education in these locations is the task of municipal governments, but is also in the sphere of state and federal government.
Florestania is the state of citizenship of the forest, established in the conquest of new rights by communities historically excluded from Brazilian public life. The country and the language are neglectful in the respectful treatment of their population that is also “citizens” of the forest.
An example of this is the unnecessary crisis in relation to the network of schools in riparian and Quilombola settlements and villages, promoted by the government of Pará. The modular education system [created to bring in-person education, with teachers in the classrooms, to remote regions, and in the case of indigenous peoples, with teaching materials that respect the knowledge, languages, and traditions of each ethnicity] is being reduced to the offering of distance learning. This was originally a presential system, with teachers in the classroom, but this modular system of teaching is being reduced to the offer of distance learning.

For Indigenous Peoples, the “new teaching law” undermines in-person Indigenous education and threatens the guarantee of teachers for classroom instruction. Photo: Walter Kumaruara / @pivide_kumaru.
The governor and his education secretary are being confronted by the indigenous movement, which does not accept the substitution of on-site classes for online lessons in the settlements and has gained the support of teachers, social movements, and civil society.
It is a spark that could burn down the dream of the government of Pará —and of Brasília — regarding the realization of what should be the most important meeting of heads of State in the Amazon.
The participation of the peoples of the forest in COP30 is expected by all the international organizations involved in the issue of climate change. One of the reasons for the choice of this capital to receive the event is its proximity to the natural areas, its rivers, and its forests inhabited by native peoples, with their traditional ways of life and knowledge of the Amazonian biome.
The esteemed leaders of these forest communities, present at all the Climate Conferences and that guided the debate of COP30, may now be the obstacle in the path of Helder Barbalho (MDB), who is the great beneficiary in the choice of this Amazonian capital to receive the most important debate on climate change on the planet.
The indigenous peoples want to preserve the experience of school teaching at the hundreds of educational addresses in the settlements for over 50 ethnicities, with their own pedagogical foundations in a differential education.
In the face of the substitution of on-site classes for video lessons, in the new modality proposed by the current secretary, the activist Alessandra Korap, of the Munduruku people, explains:
“The state of Pará has various peoples, over 50 indigenous peoples. Imagine a TV talking a language and the students not understanding what the teacher is saying on the TV. Online classes are no good to us because many students don’t speak Portuguese”. For Korap, “This is a violation of our rights, a violation of our culture. This is very serious”.
The mobilization, started by the indigenous, has gathered many representatives of the society of Pará, with teachers and civil servants joining the struggle out of respect and for autonomy in school education. Society is increasingly coming to the realization that the change in the system of teaching will not be restricted to the indigenous peoples, understanding that all the forest peoples will be affected.
The film “Amazônia, a Nova Minamata?” (The Amazon, the New Minamata), by Jorge Bodanzky, has the unmistakable voice of Alessandra Korap denouncing the tragedy that the invasions of illegal miners have brought to the region of Tapajós, aggravating the situation of threats in which the riparians and the indigenous settlements live, now with their rivers and lakes contaminated with mercury.
It is the voices of the forest that denounce the destruction of the biome and, today, the de-structuring of the education system, which is essential for the formation of leaders for a new generation conscious of the need to change the relationship that we have with the forest to one of reciprocity.
The clashes in regard to our common future, which should occur during COP30, have already begun in Belém.
This article was originally published in Portuguese in Folha de S. Paulo.
Ailton Krenak is an indigenous leader, environmentalist, philosopher, poet, writer, and honorary doctor from the Federal University of Juiz de Fora (UFJF). He starred in one of the most striking scenes of the Brazilian Constituent Assembly, in 1987, when he painted his face to protest against the attacks on indigenous rights. He participated in the Union of Indigenous Peoples, which became the Alliance of Forest Peoples, together with David Kopenawa Yanomami and Chico Mendes. Together with his people in the Rio Doce region, he faced the effects of the collapse of the Fundão dam in Mariana, Minas Gerais.
Translation: Marcos Colón
Page Layout: Alice Palmeira
Editor-in-Chief: Glauce Monteiro
Editorial Director: Marcos Colón