Daily Archives: September 29, 2023

Photo: Divulgação Assobio

At the end of August, 25 businesses operating in the Amazon met in Belém (PA) and founded Assobio (Associação de Negócios da Sociobioeconomia da Amazônia).

With the intention of acting as a network, seeking to strengthen cooperation and representation between businesses linked to socio-biodiversity in the region, the association brings together businesses from different sectors, including food, beverages, cosmetics, fashion and services that have the common purpose of promoting development sustainable development in the Amazon, encourage entrepreneurship and enhance coordination between actors.

AMAZ was present, as an observer, at the meeting that approved the statute of Assobio, which has many businesses on its staff that have gone through days promoted by the accelerator and also by the Floresta+ Aceleraçao Program, promoted by the UNDP and the MMA, whose implementing partners Idesam, AMAZ and Sense-Lab. And also businesses that are now part of the accelerator’s portfolio.

Assobio informs that it has support from the Certi Foundation, GIZ, Clua and CESUPA.

“Generating innovative and sustainable businesses in the Amazon is, in addition to an opportunity for the region, a new way for Brazil to value its riches and generate development from them, acting locally and thinking globally. We often try to copy foreign models and the businesses that associate here show innovations based on our biome and our identity, a timely and necessary path when we have the privilege and responsibility of being born with an Amazon at home”, highlights Paulo Reis , president of the association.

Around four months after launching an innovative product – powdered nut milk –, Mahta continues to develop products, promoting improvements in packaging and offering practicality and sustainability options.

In August, the business launched a new packaging size for its first market product, Superfoods Amazônicos em Pó, offering 840g (economy) and 360g options. Powdered chestnut milk was already available in 240g and 600h packaging.

Furthermore, Mahta changed the packaging material, which is now made from sugarcane-based bioplastic, with direct printing, carrying the I'm Green seal – which provides a lower carbon footprint and ease of recycling.

And another new addition is coming: a super coffee with Amazonian and natural ingredients – Café Apuí Agroflorestal, guaraná from Maués and Marapuama.

Chestnut milk has good public acceptance

The chestnut milk powder was launched during Naturaltech, the largest natural products fair in Latin America, in June this year, at which time Mahta also announced the arrival of a new partner: Chef Thiago Castanho from Pará.

“The acceptance of milk by the public has been very good. The product's differentiator, in addition to innovation, is that it replaces animal milk, having great appeal to vegans and, at the same time, contributing to the climate issue, both by conserving areas and by not emitting methane from the production of animal milk. In addition to being the first plant-based nut milk powder in the world, it is 100% regenerative, because the nuts come from the extraction of small producers in the Amazon”, says Max Petrucci, founding partner of Mahta.

Max highlights the reduction in carbon footprint and several other advantage points: “You carry a 240-gram package instead of 5 liters, which is the amount of nut milk that the economical package produces. In addition to the transportation issue, there are five fewer tetrapacks per package. And the possibility of preparing as much milk as the person wants, in different dilutions. The price per liter of milk in the signature economical packaging (600g) is around 30% cheaper than similar liquids purchased at the supermarket.”

Since the product was launched on the market, sales of nut milk powder have been growing by around 30% per month. And Mahta projects the company to grow by 600% between January 2023 and January 2024.

Photo: ACAE/Disclosure

Know to communicate. This is the motto of the expedition that Academia Amazônia Ensina (ACAE) is promoting on October 1st to 6th, aimed at members of Aberje (Brazilian Business Communication Association), and which is sponsored by the German multinational Basf and Itaú Unibanco, in addition to support from Bayer and LATAM Airlines.

ACAE has prepared an exclusive itinerary for professionals who work with communication and sustainability in companies. The journey "From Traditional Knowledge to Contemporary Science: training Communicators for Sustainability” provides contact with people, spaces and dynamics that cover topics such as research and development, bioeconomy, community-based entrepreneurship and sustainable production chains, for example. Participants will also attend lectures, technical visits, take cultural tours and discover guided trails, both by land and water.

Maria Eugênia Rocha Tezza, executive director of ACAE, highlights that one of the great differences of the expeditions promoted by the Academy is that the experience is guided by people who live in the Amazon, such as community leaders, representatives of Brazilian teaching and research institutions and communicators locations.

“When we talk about the Amazon, we talk mainly about the people, the people of the forest. We have an immensity of green forest forming incalculable biodiversity, but people are the highlight of this specific journey, which focuses on the power of communication to promote sustainable practices and encourage conservation and protection of nature. Let's talk to the researcher born and raised in Manaus, with very in-depth and specific knowledge about a certain area of nature, and with the riverside, tourism and community-based entrepreneur, for example. They are rich people and stories, and breathtaking experiences”, says Maria Eugênia.

ACAE carries out five expeditions in 2023

This year, Academia Amazônia Ensina promoted two expeditions open to the public, in January and July. In the latter, it was supported by Emissora Globo in Paraná, which is preparing a special article on connections between the Amazon and the Atlantic Forest. In May, a third expedition was promoted, this time involving two theater troupes, one Brazilian and the other from Denmark.

In August, ACAE carried out the Latimpacto expedition, aimed at an international audience who were in Brazil participating in the  Impact Minds 2023 Conference: Stand Together 2023, looking at business challenges and opportunities related to the bioeconomy. And it is now heading towards the fifth expedition of the year together with Aberje, involving the areas of sustainability, business and corporate communication and corporate social management.

“We are very happy with the path ACAE has taken. We realize the importance of being in these different environments so that dialogue can happen, but also so that concrete things can happen. I feel that the Academy is playing its role, as always proposed, which is to prepare people for the economic, social and ecological challenges of the 21st century. And we are very excited about this opening, especially with the B2B and corporate public, to understand the Amazon in this contextualized way”, highlights Maria Eugênia.

And ACAE is also now open for registration for the January 2024 expedition, open to the public, having already filled 50% of the vacancies offered.