After a first promising German-Brazilian workshop on medicinal plants, which the JKI and the University of the State of Amazonas (UEA) hosted in Manaus on May 21, a closer cooperation between the University and the JKI is now being sought.
In this region, a hot spot of biodiversity, many important medicinal plants still grow wild and are collected, processed and distributed by small agricultural enterprises. These farms play an important role in the region's bio-economy and are supported by the government and by non-profit organizations. For this reason, high-ranking representatives of the Amazonas regional government, the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation, the Alliance for Bio-Economy of the Amazonas (Abio) and the Sustainable Amazonas Foundation (FAS) attended the event.
The aim of the workshop was to identify existing expertise and, by pooling it, to support the sustainable use of medicinal plants from the Amazonas region in the future. The Sustainable Amazonas Foundation, an important regional foundation, has posted a short report on the visit of the German delegation on its website (http://fas-amazonas.org/2019/05/comitiva-de-alemaes-visita-modelo-sustentavel-de-geracao-de-renda-em-comunidade-no-rio-negro/?lang=en)
Sixty representatives of the above and other institutions, including the JKI scientists Dr. Frank Marthe and Dr. David Riewe, exchanged views on urgent issues and, in a concluding discussion, worked out common focal points. Dr. Marthe presented these workshop results to a broad, primarily political audience on 24 May in Rio de Janeiro at the "GreenRio" bio-economy trade fair. Also at GreenRio, in which the JKI had already participated in 2017, a "Joint Declaration of Intent" was signed by the JKI and its counterpart on the Brazilian side, the Agricultural Research Corporation EMBRAPA (see also Press Release from 29 May 2019).