By Regilon Matos
With the aim of raising awareness and training youth on environmental issues, to reduce the effects of global warming and ensure climate balance, the French Embassy in partnership with the Casa Socioambiental Fund and a network of organizations, will hold the third edition of LAB Jovens (Laboratório Ambiental Brasil Jovens), a program that mobilizes young people between 18 and 26 years old for support and training, with the support of tools, mentoring and all necessary support to develop action projects in their territories, and in the end the opportunity to receive support from a seed fund. The journey is 100% online and free, and I, Regilon Matos, had the opportunity to participate in the first edition in 2021.
The Casa Fund is dedicated to the field of socio-environmental philanthropy, making resources reach directly into the hands of the real guardians of ecosystems, in order to promote sustainable development, giving groups more autonomy and protagonism. Therefore, supporting youth projects is enhancing the project's action as they are able to bring together a huge diversity of ideas and mobilize a greater number of engaged people, in addition to a focus on innovative actions and connected with other more contemporary forms provided by youth protagonism. And the Casa Fund's support for the program's Seed Fund is in line with our mission of supporting collective initiatives and encouraging young people's activism to be awakened by bringing other forms of action to the socio-environmental justice agenda.
For Mariam Massoud, Technical Cooperation Advisor at the French Embassy in Brazil: “LAB Jovens is a super opportunity for young people between 18 and 26 years old to put their involvement in environmental protection into practice. Young Brazilians are very engaged and encouraged to act, and it is very motivating to work with young people full of ideas and initiatives. The seed fund offered to them is a first step in their lives as activists, and I think the program allows them to plant the first seed in their lives as sustainable entrepreneurs.”
In its three editions, the program had more than 1000 registrations from young people from all Brazilian regions, who went through a training path, raising awareness through thematic webinars. Training was carried out with workshops on activism, project creation, educommunication and good practices to strengthen project management skills, in addition to online meetings to encourage the generation of ideas in the collective. Strengthening these and other skills is essential for youth to play an active role in society, especially in debates on mitigating and adapting to climate change.
The themes of the program's editions follow indications related to agreements and treaties established by the United Nations (UN), such as the commitment to the 2030 Agenda, the Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development, as well as the Decade of Restoration of Ecosystems, among others. The first edition of LAB Jovens, in 2021, had as its theme a focus on Defenders of the oceans and rivers through the following approach: “The fight against water pollution and the fight against microplastics”. In 2022, the theme was “Preserving the biodiversity of rivers and oceans” and for the third edition in 2023 the theme will emphasize “The preservation of Brazilian forests.”
The Iguatu collective project is an example of the potential of youth cooperation and articulation. Coordinated by two young women from Manaus and a representative from São Paulo, the collective created an environmental education project focusing on children and teenagers living in Parque das Tribos, the first indigenous neighborhood in Manaus made up of more than 35 different ethnicities. The community embraced the project that aims to transform one of the streets into a zero waste model, and the idea is to replicate the initiative throughout the neighborhood and promote the recovery of the riparian forest by planting native seedlings.
LAB Jovens goes far beyond a training and support program, as it also enables personal and professional growth, connects and strengthens relationships between youth, reinforcing individual and collective experiences, with local and regional approaches, and as stated by young Nádia Carvalho, Zootechnician, Master's student in Systematics, Use and Conservation of Biodiversity and young woman selected to receive the seed fund in the 2022 edition with the Ecomar project, “LAB Jovens allows youth to dream, plan, believe and develop projects that change not only the lives of dozens or hundreds of people, but our lives as creators”. According to Nádia: “The motivation for creating the Ecomar Project came after dialogue with algae growers and reading scientific works that reported the reduction of algae beds and needlegrass meadows in some places in the Northeast, such as in Icapuí. So, I started thinking about alternatives that would make it possible to help contribute to its conservation in the region, which in addition to being located in Environmental Protection Areas, has a rich biodiversity. The project uses Environmental Education as a tool to raise awareness for the conservation of these environments, and in addition to increasing the target audience's knowledge about algae, needlegrass and their importance for marine species”, explains the young scientist.
It is important to offer support to the strong youth movement so that socio-environmental impact work in their territories, while debating global issues, receives the necessary support. In this way, reinforcing young people's skills is essential for them to be able to have an active position in society and giving youth a leading role with the necessary tools to acquire knowledge, stimulating curiosity and creativity is fundamental for them to become responsible and build a promising future.
Regilon Matos (Régis) participated in the 2021 edition of LAB Jovens, he is 24 years old and works in the program area of the Casa Socioambiental Fund. Régis is a Civil Engineer by training, postgraduate in Social and Cultural Project Management, fellow of YCL and RBMA Youth Network, leader of climate reality through the Climate Reality Project Brasil, and member of the Youth Advisory Committee for European Union Cooperation in Brazil.
