SÃO JOÃO DA PONTA, Brazil — On a sweltering morning, Ivone and Iza Farias load their handmade crabbing traps into their boat and set off along the Mocajuba River in the Amazonian mangroves of northern Brazil. The motor’s rattle drowns out the hum of cicadas and trills of birds as they glide down the still estuary. One by one, Iza tosses the baited traps into the water by the riverbank as the boat chugs along.

“This is our supermarket,” she tells Mongabay, gesturing toward the spindly roots stretched into the water. “This is where our money comes from. This is where everything we have comes from.”

The shellfish gatherers circle back and guide the boat toward the submerged traps, pulling them out of the water in hope of finding a crab inside. They keep the large crabs and toss back the small ones. Harvesting the crabs this way, along with practices like not fishing during the crabs’ breeding season, helps preserve the population.

Sisters Ivone and Iza live in the São João da Ponta Extractive Reserve, a protected area that balances the needs of traditional communities and wildlife conservation by allowing sustainable, small-scale extractive practices, such as hunting, fishing and harvesting. It’s one of 23 protected areas overlapping the world’s largest continuous belt of mangroves that covers the Amazonian coast of Brazil’s Amapá, Pará and Maranhão states.

In the past two decades, Brazil has lost 20% of its mangrove cover. Extractive reserves play a crucial role in mitigating the significant impacts of human activities on mangroves, which are vital ecosystems for preventing coastal erosion, storing carbon and supporting millions of people. Mangroves store more carbon per hectare than tropical rainforest, studies have found. However, in Brazil they continue to face localized threats such as fires, logging, and the encroachment of monocultures like coconut and oil palm plantations.

Crucial to controlling these threats are women like Ivone and Iza, who are part of the Mothers of the Mangroves network, an all-female collective with more than 800 fishers, shellfish collectors and artisans from 12 coastal extractive reserves in Pará. Working together, they act as guardians of the mangroves and their traditional heritage while ensuring financial security within their communities.

“To care for our coastline, our sea, our territory is a legacy and responsibility that we carry,” Renilde Piedade da Silva, a community leader in the Mothers of the Mangroves network in the Mocapajuba Marine Extractive Reserve, tells Mongabay during a visit to the São João da Ponta Extractive Reserve. “We, the Mothers of the Mangroves, have a mission to show that the mangroves are not just a source of income, food and livelihood; it’s responsible for life on the planet.”

Challenging the status quo

The women gather in a sheltered patio of a single-story home in the village within the São João da Ponta reserve. Sitting in a wide circle, they discuss the quality of local crab meat. They explain that their crab meat is known for being premium and pure, unlike cheaper varieties that may be mixed with other meats such as stingray. Their status as an all-women collective from an extractive reserve adds further value, they say. Silva then delivers a speech about the importance of their network and the goals they’ve achieved in the past year.

“It’s not just about making money. It’s about protecting and taking care of where you live,” she says. “Our main objective as an extractive reserve is to strengthen and care for our way of life. We give visibility to our way of life.”

In this region of Brazil, which has the highest number of fisherwomen in the country, women shoulder the dual responsibilities of providing for and caring for their families, as well as identifying predatory extractive activities in their area. Despite their crucial role, female extractivists have typically been undervalued and overlooked in their communities and territories, the women in the reserve tell Mongabay.

This started to change in 2021 after a campaign led by the nonprofit Rare Brasil and social organization Purpose highlighted the role of extractivist women in their traditional communities and the health of the mangroves. It featured a four-part video series showing the women practicing their sustainable fishing, and a cookbook, Cozinha do Maré (The Tide’s Kitchen), showcasing traditional recipes and Amazonian cultural aspects.

From there, the women formed the Mothers of the Mangroves network to increase their visibility and bolster the defense of the ecosystems they depend on. Despite having hundreds of members, the network is tight-knit. Silva describes the group as a “hive,” with the leaders known as the “queen bees” and the rest of the members as the “little bees.” With continued financial and educational support from Rare Brasil, the network engages in a wide range of activities designed to improve their standard of living while also protecting the mangrove.

“It is important to increase our income, but the most important thing is for us to participate, to learn more, to be informed of our rights,” Carmelita de Fátima Sousa Luz, a community leader from the São João da Ponta reserve and board member of the Extractive Reserve Mother Association, tells Mongabay.

The network organizes community-based meetings, discussions, forums and seminars to teach best sustainable practices for fishing and harvesting resources in the mangroves, such as what species to go after at certain times to preserve biodiversity. It also includes financial education initiatives, entrepreneurship promotion, and savings clubs for individuals and communities.

Through seed funds, each saving club earns a micro-investment of up to 5,000 reais (about $900) to finance a venture related to fishery activities, natural medicines, local food, or sustainable crafts and fashion. One community invested in a sewing machine to produce more artisanal clothes and accessories, while the São João da Ponta collective invested in a freezer to store fish to sell later and help boost local income.

Others, such as the Santa Clara and Tatu communities, used native tree seeds and traditional knowledge to produce natural oils and sold them at fair-trade markets while raising the importance of conserving nearby mangroves — all of which contribute to stronger environmental protection and sustainable development.

“It goes to show just what a small investment can lead to,” Bruna Melo, a financial inclusion and market access analyst at Rare Brasil, tells Mongabay, adding that the initiative also has a wider impact in forging collaboration within the community.

“Even though these initiatives generate income, our evaluation revealed that the focus was not primarily on earnings but on the sense of community and coexistence among [the women],” she says. “The impact is more in the social issue, of protagonism, and the empowerment of women.”

The success of Mothers of the Mangroves challenges deep-rooted social inequalities, especially regarding the roles of men and women in income generation. “Sometimes it hurts men knowing a woman earns more than her husband,” Silva says. “But that’s the reality. And that’s what we go after, so the women don’t just stay at home.”

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  Ivone Farias from the São João da Ponta Extractive Reserve prepares to head out crab fishing on the Mocajuba River. Image courtesy of Rare Brasil.
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  The women of the Mothers of the Mangroves network gather to discuss fishing practices, selling tactics, achievements over the past year, and to foster a deep-rooted community spirit. Image courtesy of Rare Brasil.
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  Renilde Piedade da Silva, a community leader with the Mothers of the Mangroves network in Mocapajuba Marine extractive reserve, with the "Cozinha do Maré" (The Tide’s Kitchen) cookbook showcasing traditional Amazonian recipes. Image courtesy of Rare Brasil.
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  Communities in the marine extractive reserves in the state of Pará depend on the mangroves for their food and livelihoods. The mangroves are also deeply connected with their ancestral heritage and culture. Image courtesy of Rare Brasil.
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  Through the savings club, the women of Mothers of the Mangroves in the São João da Ponta Extractive Reserve purchased a freezer, allowing them to store fish and boost their income. Image courtesy of Rare Brasil.

Wider reach

To emphasize the importance of protecting the mangroves and preserving their traditional ways of life, representatives of Mothers of the Mangroves have participated in several national seminars. They also joined Greenpeace’s Amazon Coast Expedition in March to highlight the threats of possible oil extraction in the Amazon Estuary; state-owned oil compnay Petrobras has plans to drill deep-sea wells near the mouth of the Amazon River. Silva says they hope to continue expanding their network to include other women extractivists, not just in Pará but worldwide.

The group’s efforts are gaining recognition. In October last year, the Spanish Embassy in Brazil awarded the network a Rural Women Award, which accepts entries from rural women’s collectives across Brazil and aims to acknowledge and value women’s roles in agriculture, leadership and environmental protection.

“[Our role] is to not deforest, not degrade, and not throw trash. It’s about raising awareness among our community in the reserves,” Silva says. “Families from within the reserve believe that they live in the best place in the world. When we see devastation in another place, we wonder why these people didn’t also take care of the place where they live.”

Despite living in one of the world’s best-preserved mangrove areas, conditions for traditional communities remain far from ideal. Most lack infrastructure such as paved roads, basic sanitation and sometimes even clean drinking water. But the women tell Mongabay that what matters most to them is the preservation of their mangroves and their culture.

“Everything I am today is thanks to the Mothers of the Mangroves network,” Silva says. “We simply want our territory preserved and respected, both local residents and fisherpeople, especially women.”

Banner image: Women in the São João da Ponta Extractive Reserve fish for crabs on the Mocajuba River in the Amazonian mangroves of northern Brazil. Image courtesy of Rare Brasil.

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