Protecting the Rainforest and Indigenous Communities from Climate Change

Dear Customers of Whole World Botanicals,

You are our partners in helping to transform the world through the use of herbal medicine and via our work to protect its habitat. For that reason, Elena and I want to share with you some recent disturbing phone reports we’ve had from Peru.

Our botanical partners who live and work in the Peruvian rainforest region are in a state of shock over what is happening to their environment. In recent phone conversations, they are telling us that they’ve never seen anything like it. The worst drought in recorded history in the region has left the depth of the Amazon River near Iquitos – where the river begins and runs from west to east towards Brazil – at only one and a half meters. That is so shallow a grown man could cross the river standing up.

Boat travel, except by the smallest kayak, has become completely impossible. This is a major problem because boats are the only way to move from one place to another, outside of the few urban areas in the region. Without boat transportation, people living in the small settlements along the Amazon and its numerous tributaries have become prisoners, unable to move out of their landlocked locations to engage in trade, visit family, get emergency medical treatment, attend school, or get access to food, clothing, and essential supplies.

Our friends in Peru have never experienced anything like this! The Amazon is virtually drying up!  Although this extreme weather crisis is expected to be temporary – we are at the peak of the dry season now – people are profoundly scared. They know that the plants and animals in their tropical environment are ALSO being affected and will continue to be impacted in ways they cannot anticipate.  The feelings of unease and uncertainty are palpable.

Along with the drought and resulting transportation shutdown, wildfires are moving across the Amazon landscape at an unprecedented scale. And, shockingly, there are also reports of hailstones pummeling the Amazon River Basin. It is surreal!  We listen to these stories with a feeling of some desperation.  When will the world wake up and realize that we are – all of us – in a perilous situation? We must move faster, with great focus and intention, to avoid increasingly widespread climate disasters.

The Amazon rainforest holds some of the most powerful natural medicines on our planet. You, our customers, have experienced the miracles of these great protectors and healers. More than most, you have a very personal awareness of the importance of the Amazon rainforest to humanity, as well as to the Indigenous people who call the Amazon home.

If we fail to get involved and persuade the powers of government and industry to change their policies of ignorance and indifference, we are putting our sacred planet in immediate and long-lasting peril, and endangering ecosystems on which humanity, and the animals and plants, depend.

Thank you for being a Whole World Botanicals customer, and we hope you can join us in protecting and advocating for the Amazon rainforest and Indigenous peoples as they confront the challenges of climate change.

Viana Muller and Elena Rojas Martinez
~Cofounders, Whole World Botanicals