Council for Cultural and Biological Diversity /
Fundación OSA
To learn about our non-profit work in the Andes and Amazon of Ecuador and on the Osa Peninsula of Costa Rica, visit www.4biodiversity.org and rainforestconservationprojects.org
The Council for Cultural and Biological Diversity,
known in Spanish as Fundación OSA (Organización
Social y Ambiental), is a non-profit
organization with active rainforest conservation and cultural heritage
projects in the countries of Costa Rica and Ecuador. Our US tax
exemption status is held under the auspices of the Living Bridges
Foundation, a non-profit 501c3 registered organization based in
Aptos California, USA.
Purpose and Intention
- To support the protection of rainforest and other wilderness
and natural areas, through diverse methods and strategies.
- To document and rescue vanishing plant lore and create a new
ethnobotany that seeks to strengthen the bridge of knowledge
transmission among elders and youth.
- To protect Indigenous medicinal plant knowledge and support
traditional healers.
- To assist Indigenous people’s communities in their struggle
for cultural and territorial autonomy.
- To enact programs which encourage the revivification of an
ecologically sound and economically sustainable relationship
between people and the forest.
- To promote rainforest conservation projects and offer volunteer
opportunities.
Overview
The Council for Cultural and Biological Diversity, in Spanish
known as Fundación OSA, is a collaborative
effort among a small group of concerned individuals in Costa Rica,
Ecuador and the United States in the fields of fundraising and
proactively endorsing rainforest and wildlife conservation and
cultural heritage revivification projects among Indigenous minorities
and rural peoples' communities. The work supports the struggle
for cultural and territorial autonomy through land purchase programs
and in the past via demarcation and decolonization programs.
We have dedicated efforts to cultural heritage rekindling processes
that includes participatory ethnobotanical and ethnographical
field documentation and publication of this material in bilingual
education booklets for local schools. It has also included the
preservation of medicinal plant knowledge via workshops and educational
council gatherings as well as the protection of the plants themselves
in ethnobotanical gardens, in situ. Our work has always been in
collaboration and support of traditional healers and their healing
methods.
Among indigenous peoples communities our approach is holistic
and direct in nature aimed at finding creative ways to bridging
the gap among the generations in order to collaborate in the efforts
of safeguarding the rainforest and the knowledge pertinent for
continued sustainable living, healing and well being.
Our strategy addresses the specific needs of the region in which
we work. In the Ecuadorian Amazon many of the Indigenous groups
have obtained legal title to their communally held lands, which
collectively amount to hundreds of thousand of acres of primary
rainforest. The fact that these forest lands are held communally
by Indigenous communities does not mean it is protected. The Indigenous
People of the Amazon are faced with tremendous economic pressures
at the same time that their traditional cultures are undergoing
rapid change that follows modernization.
Unsustainable land-use, such as cattle and timber extraction,
is rapidly becoming the main economic activity. Through our work
in the region we have noticed that a crucial, yet often overlooked,
link in preserving the forests is the practical knowledge of the
uses and value of the forest inherited by the people of the rainforest.
This knowledge is, regrettably, disappearing even faster than
the forest itself.
It has been made clear and only after many years of experience,
that when forest peoples communities maintain their plant lore,
they also maintain respect for the forest and always have a communally
held forest reserve. On the contrary, when the knowledge of the
flora has been lost, the people practice unsustainable land use
methods and are prone to clearing the entirety of their forest
land holdings. For this reason and other reasons as well we believe
in the importance of promoting cultural revivification and supporting
Indigenous medicinal plant knowledge and healing modalities among
indigenous peoples communities as an effective strategy towards
supporting the protection of fragile rainforest eco-systems and
the good health off the people themselves.
Our projects are small steps towards the preservation of the
tropical rainforests. We create ethnobotanical gardens and cultural
centers for youth to study with the community elders. We publish
small bilingual educational books based on traditional plant lore
and its application. We also channel funding to purchase and establish
forest preserves by partnering with Indigenous communities that
have demonstrated a commitment to conservation.
With the acceleration of deforestation, forest cultures are
now more vulnerable than ever. Greater financial resources would
increase the effectiveness and outreach potential of our work
- the effectiveness of existing projects and expand our ability
to undertake new ones. We hope our work will inform and inspire
you. To concerned individuals, foundations, and private benefactors,
we express deep gratitude for your solidarity.
Staff
- Jonathon Sparrow Miller Weisberger - Director,
Ethnobotanist, Author, Rainforest Medicine: Preserving Indigenous Science in the Upper Amazon
- Ladna Miller Weisberger - Vice President,
Project coordinator in Ecuador
- Dahlia K. Miller - USA Liaison, Ph.D. Social
& Cultural Anthropology
- Donna Runnals - Director Living Bridges Foundation
- Ricardo Alvarado – Legal advisor, Educator
- Nelson Jimenez - Municipality of Osa, Costa
Rica
Costa Rican Projects
- Ethnobotany of the Osa Peninsula
- Marine turtle conservation on San Josecito Beach
- Ethnobotanical teaching center
Ecuador Projects
- Llushin River Rainforest Conservation Project with the Amazanga
community.
- Ethnobotanical studies and cultural heritage projects among
the Secoya
- Land acquisition and agricultural project with Highland Andean
Quichua
International Advisory Council
- Alex Rubin – Director, Tropical Rainforest
Coalition, USA
- Victorio Villareal Villareal - Herbologist;
Osa Peninsula, Costa Rica
- Don Pablo Amaringo - Artist and Director
of Usko Ayar School of Amazonian Painting; Pucallpa, Perú
- Dennis McKenna, Ph.D. - Director of Ethnopharmacology
Heffter Research Institute and author; USA
- Lisa Faithorn - Anthropologist, organizational
consultant, deep ecologist; USA
- Vernice Solimar - Professor & Chair of Department
of Consciousness Studies, John F. Kennedy University; USA
- Rudolf W. Becking - Professor Emeritus, Natural
Resources & Forestry, Humboldt State University; USA
- Bruce Harlow - Alternative Technology technician;
USA
- Leonard Weisberger - Artist; USA
Contact
Dahlia K Miller - International Liaison & Outreach Staff
Tel: 510-235-4313
E-mail:
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