Photo: Rodrigo Duarte/AMAZ
When it comes to the Amazon, Denis Minev, CEO of Bemol and one of the investors and founders of the impact accelerator AMAZ, is an interlocutor with varied experiences and who understands the role of different players to boost the impact ecosystem in the region.
Minev was Secretary of Planning and Economic Development of the State of Amazonas, when he helped to design institutions such as the Amazonas Sustainable Foundation (FAS) – of which he is a Counselor – and the Museum of the Amazon (Musa).
He is also an angel investor who takes risks when selecting part of his investment portfolio, understanding that this is part of the search for solutions that have a positive impact on the region's economy.
Although he recognizes that the impact ecosystem is still in its infancy, Minev sees in initiatives such as AMAZ a business catalyst that can impress by example and the positive impact generated and, thus, attract attention and investors who realize how this new economy can generate good opportunities. .
In this interview with AMAZ, Minev highlights the importance of taking advantage of the wave of attention focused on the forest to leverage a more virtuous development, which looks at the conservation of the Amazon, but also brings prosperity to its populations.
“We had three waves of attention to the Amazon. We lost the first two, which involved Chico Mendes and Marina Silva. There was a drop in deforestation, but there was no proportional improvement in living conditions. Our role is to try to take advantage of this third wave, this global mobilization that looks at the region with interest, and try to translate that into what would be a vision of prosperity in the Amazon.”
How do you evaluate the impact ecosystem in the Amazon region?
Denis Minev (DM) I still have the feeling that he is incipient, which bothers me. And this is not a criticism of entrepreneurs. My dream is for the next Guilherme Leal (Natura) to be from the Amazon. We are not at that point yet, of having this qualification among the Amazonians. So we matter. One thing I would expect from this new generation of businesses that are being accelerated by AMAZ is that they plant this seed a little deeper among the riverside people, with the communities with which they have contact, in order to inspire this movement.
Idesam and PPA (Plataforma Parceiros pela Amazônia) have been working on this front, and I have been working with Idesam for a few years now. The progress is extraordinary. But it is an advance from a small base, which still has a lot of room to develop. We do not have, for example, the riverine entrepreneur. My dream is to have this entrepreneur, who comes out of his community and manages to acquire sufficient education and business vision at the same time, perhaps influenced by some of these startups he may come into contact with.
What does it take for this ecosystem to develop faster?
DM I don't think we can be very fast, because we need examples. And there is nothing better than a successful startup. So we have to wait for them to work out to serve as an example, to demonstrate that sustainable businesses with an impact on the Amazon are good business. While we don't have these examples on a reasonable scale, I find it difficult to accelerate much. There are people who think about investing, but do not invest because they are not seeing it happen. For me, AMAZ is an attempt to set an example, it is for us to point out and show that this works here.
And we can do a little more. In AMAZ Business Calls, we encourage people to think and reflect on how to undertake. AMAZ is going to be really impactful when it takes at least two or three of these startups and they have a fair amount of success. There the game changes.
The Amazon today is in the spotlight. How to take advantage of this moment to enhance the development of new businesses that generate positive impacts?
DM Today everyone only talks about the Amazon, this movement is intense. But the international pressure is not for the development of the Amazon, but to protect the forest. We have to look for ways to stop deforestation and improve people's quality of life. And we are here at AMAZ to balance that. We are small, but if each of these companies is multiplied by 10, we will amplify the impact.
When I was in the government of Amazonas, the Amazon Fund was being created. My suggestion to them was to create a venture capital fund, or to send the best professionals here, to develop businesses and entrepreneurs. But they ended up creating a philanthropic fund to conserve the forest.
You can defend the forest against deforestation, but you have to attack deforestation by offering alternatives. This is something generational, we're going to take at least 20 years to change that key. This wave of attention to the Amazon is just beginning, I hope it will be long and lasting.
In the Amazon Concertation, what we want is to propose how we can complete the Amazon by becoming prosperous. Businesses like Inocas, BRCarbon and Floresta S/A, for example, can become big cases, and if this works, we will strengthen this wave.
AMAZ also serves as a kind of stamp and opens doors for the right investors, who have these values.
You have said that we are in the third wave of opportunities to change the key to the development of the Amazon, and that we have lost the first two…
DM There have already been waves of attention to the Amazon, we are in the third of them. My view is that we missed the previous two, which came with Chico Mendes and Marina Silva. There was a drop in deforestation, but there was no proportional improvement in living conditions, and then the gains are wasted. I think our role is to try to take advantage of this wave, this global mobilization, which looks at the Amazon with interest, but with a degree of ignorance, and translate this into what would be a vision of prosperity with sustainability in the region.
It cannot come from outside. An outsider will not be able to imagine what prosperity in the Amazon means. Looking at a riverside man who today has low education, low life expectancy, and thinking about this equation on how to change his life so that he no longer needs help and can prosper. This has to come from us. And I think this construction is what I expect from this wave of international attention. May we be able to receive resources and attention and translate that into prosperity.
Impact businesses are the best for us to take advantage of this third wave. They are also important for transforming the region and inspiring other initiatives.
What would Amazonian prosperity be?
DM We have 25 million people in the Brazilian Amazon. We also have the other neighboring Amazons. It is not possible to create a fence around the forest and try to isolate these 25 million people. A solution must be found, which I will call prosperity. You expect your child to have a better life than yours and your grandchild to have a better one than your child. There is no specific solution, but it is a principle that should also govern the environmental issue.
My grandfather, Samuel Benchimol, who was a scholar of the region and used to write a lot on the subject, always said that the Amazon needs to be treated on four bases – economically viable, socially just, politically balanced and environmentally adequate. Any solution for the region would have to go through these four bases. And he wrote this in the 1980s, but it remains applicable in 2020, and unfortunately this is still ignored by most people who interact with the region.
>> Read the interview with Antonio Ribeiro (Move Social) and Lucas Harada (Sense-Lab)
