Waorani Amazon
Ecuadorian Amazon – Working with the Waorani in World’s Most Biodiverse Place
Drawn by the biological and cultural richness that infuses the western Amazon, Matt Herring began working with the Waorani in 2009.
The main idea has been to empower locals with the knowledge necessary for a sustainable and inevitable embrace of the modern world. In 2010 and 2011, with collaborator Ciara Wirth (Stanford University), Matt helped establish a natural resource management school in one of the Waorani forest communities.
Students have been recording Waorani, Spanish and English names of hundreds of wildlife species, documenting sacred stories, exploring sustainable hunting ideals, and generally grappling with the pros and cons that modernisation brings.
Central to their catapult into the modern world is the billions of dollars worth of oil that lies below their forest home. A cultural knowledge exchange program is being planned with the Indigenous Rangers of the Kimberley (Western Australia) who share many of the Waorani’s challenges.
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