In 2022, the Cerrado and its babassu palm trees were under threat in the state of Tocantins. Draft law 776/2022, proposed by Deputy Olyntho Neto (Republicans)m planned to overturn the Free Babassu Law which prohibits the burning, felling and predatory use of babassu coconut palms. The law of protection, in force for 14 years, is the result of the struggles of female babassu coconut breakers, the custodians of knowledge and of the socio-biodiversity in the biome.
The project was approved by the Constitution and Justice Commission (Comissão de Constituição e Justiça: CCJ), and the next step would have been a vote in the plenary, if it weren’t for the resistance and coordination of the Interstate Movement of Babassu Coconut Breakers (Movimento Interestadual das Quebradeiras de Coco Babaçu: MIQCB) with social and grassroots movements, communications collectives and the press. “We were able to get our stories into several media outlets. We made noise on the networks. Several organizations and movements joined the movement. After the negative repercussions, the deputy withdrew the bill,” said Claudilene Maia, MIQCB journalist and communicator, during the II Virtual Roundtable – “Strategic Communications: narratives and knowledge of the peoples of the Cerrado”.
In a scenario of the historic concentration of the mass media, associated with the increased power of large digital platforms, it is essential to ensure arenas for traditional peoples and communities to denounce, announce and put forward their narratives to the media. To this end, the roundtable participants discussed how to boost the groups’ communications, strengthen partnerships with alternative, independent media outlets and reinforce communications within their own networks.
II Virtual Roundtable – “Strategic Communications: narratives and knowledge of the peoples of the Cerrado”.
In July, CESE ran the second roundtable, whose aim was to promote an arena for listening and exchanging knowledge about strategic communications in order to produce content and defend territorial rights. Alongside Claudilene Maia, Karine Waridã from the indigenous Xakriabá People and the Coalition of Young Xakriabá (Articulação da Juventude Xakriabá), and Viviane Brochardt from the National Agroecology Coalition (Articulação Nacional de Agroecologia: ANA), shared their experiences about grassroots communications as an integral part of the struggle.
Karine Waridã gave an example of how social media and the new technologies have facilitated information sharing and the production of content. “Our territory is very large, but we know what’s happening in every location, because we are connected, particularly as young people. In 2015, a young woman from the community was attacked by the Military Police and we were able to make this highly visible. Communications are a tool of our people’s struggle,” she said, adding that young people are the communicators of their own narratives and stories: “Through Instagram we show who we are and why we are fighting.”
Counter-hegemonic narratives, based on traditional people’s and communities’ ways of life, reveal mass media contradictions about politics and economics, and politicize the debate by announcing other ways of living, producing and communicating. In this sense, Viviane Brochardt shared ANA’s collective view of communications, under the banner of agroecology. “We construct our practices and narratives for three important elements: denunciation, announcement and testimony, raising the voices of subjects who practice agroecology. If we don’t talk through our own lens, from our own perspective, with our own discourse, nobody else will. It’s the agroecological movement that needs to do this,” she declared.
The participants stressed the importance of finding balance in the way organizations work in communications. They recognized the need to build the capacity to communicate with society, which led to a discussion about approaching the independent media as an ally in the struggle, as well as making use of mass media arenas to raise agendas.
In this regard, Brochardt explained how ANA has more permanent relationships with the independent media and described how important these were: “It’s an important relationship, not only to interact with agendas, but to be there as an active actor, constructing communications and the products that arise from them. It’s a partnership that discusses everything from the agendas to the best moment to post them,” she explained.
A parallel discussion took place about the need provide attractive information for the press, backing up narratives with material such as numbers, facts and research: “Since we don’t have direct contact with the commercial media, we support our arguments in accordance with the social and environmental functions of the law, to ensure the coconut breakers’ ways of life and to preserve the babassu palm trees. We did this during the denunciation process. And when we advertise calls for applications to the Babaçu Fund, we apply the strategy of spots to get interviews. In other words, [we respond to] the challenge of a different content format for each platform,” said Claudilene Maia from the MIQCB.
Working together and nourishing our bubbles
Based on listening and the challenges put forward by the plenary and grassroots communicators, representatives from media outlets discussed strategic communications for the defence of rights, shared with the group the structural challenges of having a presence in the territories and demonstrated their interest in opening up their channels to receive agendas and establish partnerships.
The high point of the debate was a reflection about working in partnership with peers and enhancing the reach of communications through their own networks and “bubbles,” seeking format and content that dialogues with different audiences based on the issues that mobilize them. As Karine Waridã reminded the group, communications should not only work through the internet, actions for the communities need to take place on the ground: “Our elders don’t communicate via social media, but through word of mouth. Information about the Temporal Framework only circulated via the internet. We had to hold a lot of meetings, using language adapted to our ancestors, which is how we achieved greater community mobilization,” she explained.
Thinking about strengthened communications means working collaboratively and together, and reflecting on how to enhance this work in the territories, in dialogue with historically excluded voices and bodies. These ideas were summarized well by Bianca Pyl, from Le Monde Diplomatique Brasil: “It’s important to coordinate and work in a pack, to push through our agendas and provide visibility to our themes. But it’s very difficult to pierce these bubbles, it requires certain things that we, as social movements, don’t have. So we need to nourish our own bubbles with stories, arguments, etc. Because these are the people who are going to defend their territories from people who think very differently or aren’t aware of them.”
In addition to the Le Monde editor, the meeting was attended by Thanee Degasperi, representing Mídia Ninja, Natalie Hornos and Luma Prado, communicators from De Olho nos Ruralistas and Flávia Quirino, a journalist from Brasil de Fato.