Although he is only 21, Camilo Yoge has seen his indigenous tribe lose its culture, territory and traditions. Yoge, a member of the Cofan tribe, has seen farmers, ranchers and oilmen invade his ancestral lands to plant illegal coca crops, raise cattle and search for oil. He has seen many young Cofan take to wearing Western-style clothes, listening to popular music and abandoning their native language for Spanish.
'We're losing out traditional dress, our environment,' lamented Yoge, who is st more...
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Amazon Conservation Team is working in partnership with indigenous people in conserving biodiversity, health, and culture in tropical America. The work of the Amazon Conservation Team is based on ethical relationships with its indigenous partners.
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Ethno-botanists, people who study the relationship between plants and people, have long been aware that rainforest dwellers have an astounding knowledge of medicinal plants.
For thousands of years, indigenous groups have extensively used rainforest plants for their health needs -- the peoples of Southeast Asian forests used 6,500 species, while Northwest Amazonian forest dwellers used 1300 species for medicinal purposes. Today pharmacologists and ethno-botanists work with native healers and sh more...
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Deep in the most remote jungles of South America, Amazon Indians (Amerindians) are using Google Earth, Global Positioning System (GPS) mapping, and other technologies to protect their fast-dwindling home. Tribes in Suriname, Brazil, and Colombia are combining their traditional knowledge of the rainforest with Western technology to conserve forests and maintain ties to their history and cultural traditions, which include profound knowledge of the forest ecosystem and medicinal plants.
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Indigenous knowledge has long been exploited for profit by outside groups, while local communities see few benefits. A new report suggests reform may lie in promoting self-governance rather than conventional IP laws.
Promoting capacity for self-governance rather than using conventional systems governing intellectual property rights may be a more effective way to safeguard traditional knowledge of indigenous groups, argues a new report published by an international team of IP experts.
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The World Health Organization estimates that the majority of the population of most non-industrial countries still relies on traditional forms of medicine for everyday health care. I n many countries up to 80-90% of the population are in this category. Medicinal plants and, to a lesser but important extent, animal products, form the materia-medica of these traditions.
Traditional health systems are based in world views or cosmologies that take into account mental, social, spiritual, physical more...
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Widows who submit to purification rituals are obliged to have unprotected sex three times a day over the course of a week. The practice is thought to purify a woman and her home after her husband's death and is common among members of the Sena ethnic group in Sofala, Mozambique. Officials say it may be dueling HIV prevalence rates in the area as high as 25%.
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