This week, we’ve been organising our Rainforest Experience Days that will teach local students from the nearby community of Salvacion about the importance of biodiversity.
Once a month, we will begin hosting groups of local students at the Manu Learning Centre (MLC) and take them out into the reserve so they can better understand and value the forest.
Despite living in the Amazon, many of the children have not been out into the jungle and are not familiar with their local wildlife.
While enjoying the sheer beauty of the rainforest and meeting its many wild creatures, the students will also learn more about why scientific research and biodiversity conservation is so important.
They’ll be taught how to carry out butterfly transects so that they can get involved in basic surveying techniques and discover why they’re important. They will then play a identification game to help them learn how to spot the difference between species.
While on a tour of our biogarden, they will find out about the importance of growing organic produce and they will explore the different plants in our medicinal garden.
They’ll learn about the importance of reusing and recycling by making a plant pot out of a plastic bottle. By taking the plant home with them they’ll continue to grow and nurture their gift from the rainforest.
Finally, they’ll take part in an English lesson and a cultural exchange by meeting all the team here at the MLC who come from different places across the world.
Why is environmental education needed?
Many local people don’t realise that the Manu Biosphere Reserve where they live is one of the most biodiverse places in the world.
The small town of Salvacion, where the children are from, is not a community of people who have lived in the Amazon for very long. They’re from the Andes and moved here firstly in the 1960s and then expanded in the 1980s when land was cheap and they were looking for ways to improve their livelihoods by exploiting the forest’s natural resources – gas extraction, mining and logging.
Through education and sustainable initiatives our aim is to change the local community’s relationship with the forest, from exploitation to preservation, while also improving their livelihoods and living standards.
Education is central to our work here at the MLC and we are looking to inspire the next generation so that they become ambassadors for conservation within their community.