The movement linked to organic agriculture in Brazil will launch, on Thursday (3) in São Paulo, a national level entity to represent the sector. The members of the Organic Brazil Institute (IBO) will work mainly in Brasilia, consolidating, promoting and suggesting public policies aimed at sustainable food cultivation.
This work will be done “in a very technical and political way, subsidizing parliamentarians and other stakeholders with information about organic agriculture and livestock”, comments to the blog one of the creators of the Instituto Brasil Orgânico, agronomist José Pedro Santiago, who has been working for over three decades in the segment. Santiago adds that the entity’s headquarters will be in Brasilia, due to its proximity to the country’s public and agricultural policy making center.
The inaugural assembly that will launch the Instituto Brasil Orgânico will take place this Thursday, in the Parque da Água Branca, in the west of the capital, in the amphitheater of the park, from 17h (Av. Francisco Matarazzo, 455).
The date chosen is quite significant for the Brazilian organic movement: October 3 is the anniversary of the precursor of agroecology in Brazil, agronomist Dr.. Ana Maria Primavesi, who exactly on this day will complete 99 years and will receive a tribute through her daughter, Carin Primavesi.
On the same day, geographer Virginia Knabben, who wrote Ana Primavesi’s biography, will launch the official website of the agronomist.
Antiago says that, so far, there is a list of at least 200 stakeholders, including individuals, legal entities and entities – such as the Consumer Protection Institute (Idec) – to join IBO and who should be present at the event to sign your membership form.
The Brasil Orgânico Institute will be made up of 21 counselors, chosen from several people with years of “window” in the movement linked to sustainable agriculture, such as Rogério Dias, who was coordinator of Agroecology at the Ministry of Agriculture – “Rogério, today, already works a lot. in the National Congress, in favor of organic agriculture ”, observes Santiago -; Romeo Milk, Yamaghishi Village Organic; Marcelo Laurino, Executive Secretary of the São Paulo State Organic Production Commission; Fábio Ramos, President of Agrosuisse; Alexandre Harkaly, executive director of IBD Certifications (the largest national organic certifier), Joe Valle, organic producer at Fazenda Malunga, DF, as well as global actor and organic producer Marcos Palmeira and host and influencer Bela Gil, 100% enthusiastic and diffuser of organic foods.
“The president of IBO will be chosen from among these 21 advisers,” explains Santiago. The directors will be chosen by the members. To join, there are fees from $ 50 to $ 1,000 per month, as a “maintaining partner”. “There is also the collaborating partner, for example, journalists who want to spread the organic,” says Santiago.
With all this team and the contributions of the members, Santiago comments that the objective is “to gather technical, economic and market information to subsidize the organic movement nationwide”. “We will also make a ‘melee’ with parliamentarians in Brasilia in favor of organic agriculture”, adds the agronomist, who exemplifies: “At this time when pesticides are approved in the squeegee, we want to be the counterpoint, to point out other more sustainable ways” , says. “We will act with more knowledge and less insult,” he says.
Still for Santiago, this is “the right time” for the creation of a national entity that represents and fights for the organic movement. Currently, according to the Ministry of Agriculture, Brazil has 19,000 registered organic producers, with growth of over 1,000 producers per year. In 2018, there were 1,500 new farmers. Another good “thermometer” to prove the industry’s maturity is the number of visitors to the country’s main organic products fair, Biofach Latin America: 44,000 this year. In addition, Brazil already has 957 organic fairs. Finally, Brazil is among the top ten exporters of organic food in the world, in a world market that moves US $ 90 billion per year.
Source: Estadão – Organic Foods
Photo: AGLIBERTO LIMA / ESTADÃO
