Letter from Brazil - Stories by Mario Osava / IPS Inter Press Service

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Sunday, November 22, 2009 04:18 GMT

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Branching Out in Alliances as Emerging Global Actor
By Mario Osava
RIO DE JANEIRO - Brazil and France have "similar interests in the area of global geopolitics" and Brazil shares "affinities in terms of circumstances and values" with India and South Africa, Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso Amorim said Friday, explaining his country's growing "extra-regional" alliances.
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Artistic Energy as Antidote to Exclusion
By Mario Osava
SALVADOR, Brazil - Putting the power of art to the test in extreme situations has become an unintended but necessary task for the Axé Project, a Brazilian non-governmental organisation (NGO) aimed at creating the conditions for street kids and other at-risk children to overcome educational, family and community exclusion.
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From Learning Circle to Flights of Artistic Imagination
By Mario Osava
ARAÇUAÍ, Brazil - Slender, small and long-haired, 11-year-old Higor Fonseca sounds much older when he talks. He has a great deal to tell, in spite of living in this small, sleepy town in the interior of Brazil, where most workers are employed as seasonal migrant labourers in other parts of the country.
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Changing Lives Through the Power of Dance
By Mario Osava
FORTALEZA, Brazil - "My family’s lives changed," said Maria Erilma da Silva, a mother of three girls and a teenage boy, listing a whole series of transformations, from changes in eating and personal hygiene habits to "the security of knowing where my daughters are" and even an end to her husband’s frequent drinking binges.
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A School Without Teachers
By Mario Osava
BARBACENA, Brazil - The participation of renowned professional musicians as instructors and special guests at workshops, instead of academic professors, is what sets Brazil’s Bituca University of Popular Music apart, and is earning it a reputation as a model of experimentation and excellence in music education.
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Music Education Opens Doors to Social Inclusion
By Mario Osava *
SÃO PAULO - "It takes us an hour and 20 minutes to get there. We have to walk, because we can't afford the 30-minute bus ride. But the girls never miss their music classes, not even when they have to go without lunch because they don't have time to eat after school," says their mother, Maria da Cruz.
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Bringing Community Mental Health to the Poor
By Mario Osava
FORTALEZA, Brazil - Zilá Ferreira and Juraci Lisboa were in the grip of depression since 1996 – the former over the death of her mother, and the latter because she was "abandoned with seven children under 14."
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Brazil’s Lesson to the World: Invest in Family Farming
Mario Osava interviews KANAYO F. NWANZE, president of IFAD
NOVA RUSSAS, Brazil - Kanayo F. Nwanze chose Brazil for his first official visit as the recently elected president of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD), and was pleased to personally attest to President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s commitment to family farming.
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Brazil Outshines Regional Bloc
Analysis by Mario Osava
RIO DE JANEIRO - The enthusiasm for Brazil today on the economic front and the lead role played by its government in the international arena are in stark contrast with the inertia dogging the Southern Common Market (Mercosur), the regional integration project and trade bloc that has been one of its priorities since the 1980s.
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Agricultural School Cultivates Pride in Family Farming
By Mario Osava
INDEPENDENCIA, Brazil - "Here you get an education for the country and not for the city, which is not where I live, and that’s why I can relate to this school," says Israel Santos, 16, currently enrolled in the second year of secondary school studies at an agricultural school in the municipality of Independencia, in northeastern Brazil.
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When the Arid Northeast Turns Green
By Mario Osava*
NOVA RUSSAS, Brazil - The rain - usually much desired because it is so scarce - has come in excess this year, destroying many crops. But in this farming district in far north-eastern Brazil, the impact of the heavy rainfall was less marked than in the past, thanks to the diversification of crops and productive activities.
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Seasonal Widows
By Mario Osava
ARAÇUAÍ, Brazil - Maria Vieira dos Santos has raised her six children practically on her own. For more than a decade, her husband would be away from home nearly eight months out of the year, travelling 1,500 kilometres down south to cut sugarcane in the state of São Paulo.
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Indigenous People in Colombia "Have Become a Strong Force"
Mario Osava interviews indigenous leader AÍDA QUILCUÉ
BOGOTA - There is a heavy turnover of social movement leaders in Colombia, given the frequency with which they are killed, displaced or forced into exile. And because of the dangers, those who step up to the plate can be considered veritable heroes – one of whom is indigenous leader Aída Quilcué.
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Mario Osava, IPS's Brazil correspondent, covers political, economic and social issues, including human rights, labour, environment, poverty, indigenous issues, and sustainable development. He has travelled the corners of Latin America's largest country to bring you these stories.