Lise Josefsen Hermann – DDRN

Reducing Chemical Pesticides in Agriculture in Nepal – a Planetary Health Issue

Lise Josefsen Hermann — Sun, 29 Jun 2025 15:26:14 +0000

Integrated pest management and nature-based solutions is an urgent matter to reduce the dangerous use of chemical pesticides in the production of most of our food worldwide. Nepali Professor Sundar Tiwari from Bharatpur, Nepal, dialogues with Danish Erik Jørs, associate professor in occupational medicine.

How can the use of chemical pesticides be reduced drastically worldwide without affecting the production? What consequences do these pesticides have for farmers and consumers health? And how does it affect the planetary health?

That are some of the points discussed by the Nepali researcher and professor Sundar Tiwari from Agriculture and Forestry University in Bharatpur, Nepal, who has been specializing for years in biological pest control and sustainable agriculture. In a recent recorded podcast, a part of the Nordic Talks series, he dialogues with Danish Erik Jørs, a senior physician and associate professor in occupational medicine at Odense University Hospital and University of Southern Denmark, who a large part of his working life has spent leveling global inequality in countries like Nepal, Uganda and Bolivia, focusing on pesticide poisoning in several parts of the world.

Nordic talks are dedicated to addressing the UN’s sustainable development goals and is a series of talks addressing the biggest global challenges through conversations with some of the brightest minds in the Nordics and the counterparts from around the world.

Sundar Tiwari has been working with biological pest control methods and has also been involved in research in Nepal focusing on nature-based solutions as an alternative measure to pesticides. And then he has been engaged – together with Erik Jørs – in training of farmers.

Erik Jørs has been working with pesticides since 2001, where he started a collaboration with Bolivia due to a high number of human poisonings by chemical pesticides. Later on, he started out in Uganda and Nepal.

“The extensive use of chemical pesticides is of global concern, because people are facing many challenges in agriculture and especially in the intensive agriculture they are using high dose of pesticides, which are going to affect our whole ecosystem, society, farming communities including environment and biodiversity, “ says Sundar Tiwari and continues: “People are affected by cancer in many Nepalese villages and we have been facing many environmental challenges – we are losing our aquatic biodiversity. We cannot see fish in our rivers and streams. We are losing our bees, which are very important for pollination, and also some butterflies. We’re losing these good insects, and that’s going to affect our ecosystem and our biodiversity,” explains Sundar Tiwari.

Erik Jørs has especially been focusing on farmer’s health related to the use of chemical pesticides: “…because every time they go to the field and they might have contamination of the chemical pesticide. In short run the farmers they might experience vomiting and other health related issues. But in long run this pesticide contamination and everyday consumption of the pesticide is going to affect their whole health system including cancer, blood cancer, breast cancer etc. These are some health-related issues in case of the farmers,” explains Erik Jørs.

But he is also very worried about the environmental affectation: ”It’s actually planetary health that we are talking about. It’s not only affecting the health of humans – causing deaths and poisonings, nervous diseases, cancer, problems with the fertility and so on, but it’s also affecting the fertility of the land and the preservation of the land where we are growing our food. So, if we can’t grow the amounts of food we want due to problems pesticides killing the good insects which are maintaining the ground fertile, then we will have problems with the with the lower harvests and maybe even starvation,” says Erik.

According to Sundar Tiwari, the majority of farmers in Nepal are still practicing traditional farming, but there is a big challenge or pressure created by many people migrating from the rural to urban areas, where people are focusing on increasing the production. Traditional farming has many good practices to learn from:

“They have their own practice of the cultivation like they use a local variety. They use mixed cropping, intercropping and they have a very good mechanism of maintaining the biodiversity. So, they also use some bio pesticide in local level using many plant materials together and they make a solution and they spray. So, this is a kind of biological pest control,” says Sundar Tiwari.

An important and well-known tool in the work of reducing the use of pesticides is the so-called integrated pest management – a principle promoted for years by UN’s Food and Agricultural Organization, FAO. Both Erik and Sundar have been working according to those principles.

“We teach farmers as far as possible to avoid chemicals. It’s cheaper for them and often it’s not necessary to spray with pesticides. But farmers need to know for example, if the insects in their field are beneficial or harmful to the crops, so they don’t spray the beneficial ones. And then they should use traditional methods, good farming practices including selection of the best seeds, how to water the plants when they are growing and give maybe traditional manure from the cows or whatever they have available to them,” says Erik Jørs and Sundar continues:

“So, we are integrating all methods, whatever available to the farmers. For example, seed selection. If you have a good seed, it is going to be germinated very well, and it’s can be very healthy. And the healthy plant is not going to be attacked as easily by insects and diseases. If there is no insects and diseases, then farmers are not using chemical pesticide. Similarly, if you have a very good fertilizer in the soil, for example, potash or some silica, so if you integrate into the nitrogen and that crop is very healthy. That is integrated pest management. We integrate all methods so that we can reduce the pest population in the farm. The nature is full of biological control, but we are wiping out that biological control agent from the nature because of the chemical pesticide,” says Sundar Tiwari.

Also, with a consumer perspective there is a great advantage of trying to avoid the chemical pesticides in our food production: “We have tested different food items and, in many cases, we have actually found the maximum residue levels of pesticides (by WHO) have been surpassed in many cases. That means, that there is a danger for human health. Not only for the farmer spraying but also for the consumers. Nowadays we are talking a lot in Denmark about the residues of pesticides in our drinking water. And in many of the wells, pesticides have poisoned our drinking water and now we are drinking our water but contaminated with pesticides,” tells Erik Jørs.

“In Bolivia we found that children who have been exposed to pesticides during their mother’s pregnancy they do not perform as well as children without that pesticide exposure during pregnancy. So, we also have to think about the future generation when we talk about pesticides and prevention of poisonings. An important issue if we want farmers to reduce the use of pesticide and use pesticides safely when needed,” says Erik – who underlines, that at the from his perspective, it is not necessary to make radical changes and it is important to take social issues into account:

“Integrated pest management doesn’t say no to pesticides, but they say minimize the use and do only use pesticides if you are in the danger of losing your crop. Many farmers in low-income countries cannot afford to lose their crop. Then they will starve and eventually suffer a lot from that. So, they have to reach out for the ultimate solution. If they can’t find another way to combat the pest or they have a big attack of pest and they can use pesticides. But they must protect themselves and they must use the pesticide in a proper manner,” says Erik.

“It’s necessary with interdisciplinary work collaboration to minimize this problem. Many people, many organizations have been working trying to reduce pesticides, but I think it’s also very important that government prohibit the most toxic ones and demands that the farmers gets educated and take courses in proper handling of pesticides. Many low-income countries want to be able to feed themselves and be able to grow crops that can be exported. But you have to put rules on that. For example, in the EU, we control the food coming from Africa, or other parts of the world to see if they comply with the maximum residue levels that we have in the EU. I think it’s important with some kind of political strong engagement. And we have the FAO, we have the WHO, they have their guideline on this. But it’s difficult because there’s also a strong lobby from the industry producing pesticides,” says Erik.

He mentions a responsibility from the financial system: “In some cases, loans to farmers are tied to the use of pesticides. The bank wants to reassure that the loan is paid back. So, they don’t want the farmer who take a loan to grow this crop, to lose it. So, the deal is: Okay, you can have the loan, only if you guarantee that you buy this packet of pesticides too. That is an unhealthy policy to promote. So political leadership is crucial if we want to reduce the use and amount of pesticides used, “ says Erik Jørs.

And it is urgent to make a shift in the commodities production worldwide, because as many scientific studies documents, it is not sustainable if we just continue business as usual: “If we continue this farming practice we will face a human, biodiversity and environmental crisis. Research also says pesticide use contributes to increase of non-communicable disease to human beings. In the end it will affect the food and nutrition security. And if our environment is polluted, our water, air and soil is polluted, then what happen? Then you cannot get a good future. Our children will be affected. Future generations will be affected. We will be sick. The whole ecosystems will be affected by chemical pesticides,” warns Sundar Tiwari.

“If we don’t minimize the use of pesticides, then we’ll end up with problems like infertile soils, lack of bees to pollinate our plants and grow the crops. We will end up with many more poisonings especially in low-income countries. So, I really think it’s time to make a big effort and swap to more ecological farming. Not saying that we totally can avoid the use of pesticides, but at least we can minimize it a lot;” said Erik Jørs.

Lise Josefsen Hermann is a freelance journalist who has been reporting from Latin America for 15 years. She has received grants from Earth Journalism Fund, GABO Foundation, Journalism Fund, National Geographic and Pulitzer among others. Her work has been published in media like Al Jazeera, BBC, Danwatch, Dialogue Earth (former China Dialogue), Deutsche Welle, Danish Broadcasting Corporation, El País, New York Times, and Undark Magazine.

Nepali researcher and professor Sundar Tiwari from Agriculture and Forestry University in Bharatpur, Nepal, who has been specializing for years in biological pest control and sustainable agriculture in dialogue with Danish Erik Jørs, a senior physician and associate professor in occupational medicine at Odense University Hospital and University of Southern Denmark.

https://ddrn.dk/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/Nordic-Talks-Jors-og-Sundar.mp3

Venezuela: How Researching During a Humanitarian Crisis Makes You a Better Scientist

Lise Josefsen Hermann — Wed, 24 Apr 2024 15:40:37 +0000

He has his office in the campus of Harlingen in at the Institute of Neuroscience, just beside one of the entrance points for the many Latin American migrants to the US. Physician scientist expert on Blood Pressure and epidemiology in the areas of Cardiovascular and Neuroscience, Jesús Melgarejo, investigates the impact of preventable vascular conditions on brain health. He works in the Rio Grande Valley, Texas, which is also one of the cities in the US with very poor health regarding diabetes, obesity, Alzheimer’s. And we will later get to learn how all those dots are connected.

His parents are Colombian and had already migrated once from unsafe Colombia due to the country’s decadelong armed conflict between guerrillas, paramilitaries, and the military. Looking for a better future, the couple left for Venezuela where Jesús was born. Already at a young age, at his last year at high school, he showed special interest for research. He won a neuroscience competition for students at public high schools and was invited to be part of the lab. So even before studying at the university he was already part of a research group and learned important skills such as statistics and writing of reports and scientific articles.

Inequality and health
The first research project Jesus participated in was an international consortium of many countries that measured blood pressure for 24 hours to study cardiovascular diseases. Among those countries are Venezuela, Uruguay, Denmark, Belgium, Italy, Poland, Russia, China and Japan. It talks about the percentage of hypertension in all these regions.

“The important thing is that we look at the Human Development Index – which means access to health, education, economy, various factors. It generates a score – the lower the score – the worse the social, health and so on. We could see an association between index and prevalence of hypertension,” explains Jesús, who also recalls how this work was difficult to perform from Venezuela:

“Internet and these things – while I was working on the article with all these researchers I couldn’t send them an email or I couldn’t do my article. It was pretty painful. It was a stressful moment.”

Researching with power-cuts
In May 2018 Jesús graduated from medicine school, but the next month he left for a half-a-year scholarship in Colombia. Venezuela was already at the time living a very chaotic political, economic and humanitarian crisis.

“That period in Venezuela was one of the worst in my life. I earned 10-20 USD a month. That was all we had to support our home. I also worked as a freelancer – statistician, that helped a bit. If I would have stayed in Venezuela, then I could no longer support my parents, let alone myself towards building my future. I was going nowhere. I would have had to do a rural compulsory year where you earn 2-3 dollars a month. We could not live from that,” recalls Jesús Melgarejo.

His dad worked as a blacksmith while Jesus studied medicine, but he had had an open-heart surgery, so it was preferable for him not to continue the physical hard work. His mother worked as a seamstress. When he was finishing 4^th year of medical school, Jesús took over most of the financial situation of his home. This was certainly a challenge but there has always been help coming from family members as well. Starting his doctoral studies up to date, Jesús continuous supporting his parents. But to study and do research in his homeland was really difficult for Jesús and his fellow students.

“When I left Venezuela, it was very difficult to keep up. There were barely 4-6 hours of electricity per day. We had no internet – and when we had, it was only buying mobile phone data. I found it very difficult to keep up with the output research and collaborations we were doing.”

“And it is always difficult to say to someone, this week I couldn’t finish this part of the article because I didn’t have electricity nor internet. How do you say that to someone from US or Europe? They thought it was an excuse. I was collaborating with several other people from other institutions in other parts of the world. It is different if you are on your own. I remember once I had to make a PowerPoint presentation. I was doing it by hand drawing on paper and then I went to a cyber cafe to make the presentation on a computer – and here we go, let’s do this. Other times I stayed at a friend’s house or my uncle’s. Because the mobile internet was not stable enough for a virtual meeting. I had to be creative to find a way.”

The importance of mentors
Jesús was lucky to already early meet people who believed in him, recommended him and helped him on his way to continue to study abroad and broaden his horizon – both professionally and personally. The first of such persons was Gladys Maestre from the University in Maracaibo in Venezuela. She has guided and mentored Jesús since 2009 in his professional career but also has given him valuable advice of life in and out science.

“Every person gives the best of themselves. Every person has different way of being smart. What I have seen in academy is also how networking and connections are so important, crucial. To know this kind of person who can advocate for you, it is important. I could not have achieved what I have achieved to be honest without Dra. Gladys’ help,” says Jesús who also found it a hard change when he first came to continue researching in the US:

“Every time I did an internship – in Europe and USA – I felt the difference in the academic level. I was in a place that only accepted the people that used to be the best of the best, super well prepared. And then me, having studied in a public school and being first-generation in college Latin-American coming from a humble family. Obviously, there is a wall, which hit me all the time. The only thing that kept me on my feet, was my motivation. That these people gave me the opportunity – not because of what I knew – but also because I’m a person who is motivated and wants to do something.”

Academic resilience
Jesús recognizes how the difficult time in his home country also has become a strength for him:

“It has prepared me for what I face now. It has built academic resilience. And it has helped me to stay on my feet, to keep up my motivation, and wake every day with the motivation to pursue science to advance the field and look for the better good of people” says Jesús.

In May of 2019, he began his doctoral studies in the KU Leuven and obtained his PhD in Cardiovascular Science on November 18^th of 2022. The endurance and resilience he got from his life in Venezuela taught him how to face the challenges of doing a PhD in one of the elite Universities worldwide. His journey during the PhD and time in Europe boosted his career to become a better scientist but also a person. In January 17^th of 2023, he started his position as an Assistant Professor of Neuroscience at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley. In this place, Jesús continues dedicating his career to studying how blood pressure affects diseases of ageing like glaucoma, Alzheimer’s disease-related disorders, and cardiovascular complications. He focuses on how dysregulation in blood pressure affects the eyes, brain, and heart.

“There are diseases associated with longer, more frequent, and more drastic changes in blood pressure the day and night. And this can mean something bad for the structural and functional integrity of the eyes, brain, and heart. For instance, exaggerated changes in blood pressure occurring during the day can cause periods of impaired blood flow and supply to these organs because blood pressure an exaggerated blood pressure variability increases the chances of having drastic and frequent changes drops in blood pressure. Because of these drastic changes, we believe there might be an increased probability of having diseases such as glaucoma, Alzheimer’s disease-related disorders, and cardiovascular complications. There is a window opportunity for us to better understand unique aspects of these disease by looking into blood pressure over 24-hours,“ says Jesús.

Closing the research-gap in Hispanic populations
With a mind full of dreams and motivation, he hopes for instance that will allow him to understand better what happens with the brain of people with Alzheimer’s disease and related disorders.

“It is not just about giving you the pill to control your health if you for instance suffer from hypertension. There are lifestyle factors to modify such as weight, smoking, cholesterol, sugar, what you eat, walking but also social determinants of health.”

Jesús’ dream is to continue the 24-hours study in Rio Grande Valley, an area on the border of the US where most of the population is Hispanics. His work and the work of other researchers in this area have the potential to advance our understanding of vascular risk factors and Alzheimer’s disease.

“Both conditions are known to disproportionately affect Hispanics. Hispanics have more rates of vascular risk factors such as diabetes and hypertension, 1.5 higher risk compared to other populations. They also in general have fewer years of education, and poorer access to health and public transportation,” Jesús explains.

This team of researchers are still working on fully understanding this and envisions contributing to the gap in research in Hispanic populations. I met Jesús at the Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting in Medicine and Physiology in 2023, a one-week event where some 40 Nobel Laureates were the speakers. “I feel really privileged to, like other young scientists around the world, having been able to interact and discuss science with some of the most brilliant minds in history. That gives me this additional and unique boost to continue doing science,” says Jesús.

Lise is a freelance journalist based in Latin America for more than a decade. She is a Pulitzer Grantee, works for the investigative media Danwatch and has published in media like Al Jazeera, BBC, Deutsche Welle, Danish Broadcasting Corporation, El Pais, New York Times, and Undark Magazine

2018: Graduated from Medical School, Maracaibo, Zulia, Venezuela

2023: PhD in cardiovascular science, biomedical science, Leuven, Belgium

2024-present: Assistant professor of Neuroscience, Harlingen, Texas, USA

Mexico: Researching the Brain Plasticity and Breaking the Stigma of Mental Illness

Lise Josefsen Hermann — Tue, 19 Sep 2023 18:47:27 +0000

He has a passion for understanding that, what makes us human. It all started with observing neurons in a microscope, just like a Nobel Laureate 100 years ago. And this Mexican neuroscientist also wants to raise awareness of mental health to prevent the so common social stigma. Depression is one of the most common mental illnesses in the world’s population and one of the biggest risk factors for depression is chronic stress. Also, an illness that has gotten the attention of the 32 year old researcher Hiram Tendilla Beltran from Puebla, Mexico. His special interest is the plasticity of the brain.

What makes us human – Brain plasticity and mental illnesses
Hiram’s eyes glow with fascination, when he tries to explain what’s all this with brain plasticity about: “All our cells, that are these basic units that compose us have to adapt both functionally and structurally so this phenomenon in general of our cells is known as plasticity. How do they adapt? A cell can function in a specific way and with few nutrients, it adapts. But it can also be in a structural way. Maybe it needs to be closer to the neighboring cell, so it generates projections that allow it to be closer to the neighboring cell, or this second neighbor is having a process that is causing some discomfort. So, it moves away from this neighboring cell. So, this is both functional and structural adaptation specifically in the brain, known as neuroplasticity because it is the neurons that adapt. So, this plasticity is fundamental for the development of our brain. We have to generate connections known as synapses to form neural networks that are the functional substrate of the brain. So, in this way these neural networks are formed partly by plasticity. Once we have our brain fully developed, it allows us, for example, to perceive reality adequately. I am in an environment where I feel safe. I am in an environment in which I know that maybe I can consume food in a safe way and then that allows the species to survive and develop”.

And plasticity has to do with development of mental illnesses, Hiram explains: “This plasticity depends on many factors and so there are factors that can alter it. So, if plasticity is altered it can alter the development of the brain. So consequently, there will be people who are not adequately interpreting reality, who then see as aversive or harmful a stimulus that is not, and this is when neurodevelopmental disorders arise, such as autism spectrum disorders, schizophrenia. Those are people who cannot adequately perceive their reality, so they do not have a response that is congruent to the stimulus that is being presented to them. So, this is where many alterations arise, symptoms of these illnesses, where this illness arose from, this incapacity of the brain to be able to adapt adequately.”

He makes another example with the so common mental condition, stress: “When stress is chronic, it compromises brain plasticity and thus compromises these neural networks and also makes us unable to perceive reality adequately. That leads us to these episodes of sadness, lack of anhedonia, lack of pleasure, and also generates this mental illness. On one hand this is a very beautiful phenomenon because it allows us to be what we are, this magnificent species with very special cognitive capacities in nature. But it is also a finely regulated phenomenon that when it is altered, generates these disorders or mental illnesses.”

Hiram studied to be a Pharmacobiological Chemist – in other countries called biochemistry. Then he completed his master’s degree in physiology at the State University of Puebla and he received his PhD in Chemical Biological Sciences at the National Polytechnic Institute in Mexico. All of his studies, including his, bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral theses were in neuroscience. “My interest in science is what happens with brain plasticity for brain development and what happens when this brain plasticity is altered, which is a risk factor for mental illnesses, then understand how our brain adapts to form adequate connections for its functioning and then what happens when these connections are altered.”

He studies mainly through rodents, which allows them to study very specific mechanisms of brain development and mental illness at the level of plasticity. “Although it is impossible to reproduce a mental illness in rodents, both humans and rodents have a brain in which reality perception occurs, enabling surveillance. For example, both human and rodents must interpret the location of food and signals of warning, such as suspicious behavior of somebody in a dark and lonely street for humans, or the presence of a large moving object that may be a predator for rodents,” Hiram explains.

The studies give insight in the effects of the drugs used for mental illnesses: “We are interested to see what the drugs we use for the treatment of these mental illnesses do to brain plasticity. That has been our greatest scope as research, we have shown that beyond the conventional mechanisms of these drugs there are effects at the level of plasticity. In order to be able to develop new, more effective and safer drugs, brain plasticity could be a target in the future,” explains the Mexican researcher and goes with an example about the poor effects of the medicine: “Now they’re about other things: neurotransmitters, dopamine, serotonin. These drugs are generally effective, but specifically for depression and schizophrenia, more than 30% of patients at a global level do not respond to the pharmacological treatment. I’ve always thought about it like this, what if you go to the doctor for some complication and they tell you well, the treatment is going to work, but only in a third of the cases. Well, that’s what happens with these drugs for mental illnesses, that’s something we have to improve,” says the Mexican researcher.

100 year old Nobel-inspiration
Hiram recalls an important moment with his motivation for neuroscience when he volunteered in a neuropsychiatry lab: “It was there that I saw neurons under the microscope for the first time. We were using a technique known as the Golgi-technique, which was used by Santiago Ramón y Cajal more than 100 years ago (Nobelprize in Medicine 1906) to describe the theory of neural networks and which won him the Nobel Prize. Seeing it there in a microscope was like wow, seeing a neuron and in its morphology with the dendritic spines, imagining remembering all that I had read about this neuronal theory of Santiago Ramón y Cajal. Then I said – I would like to know more about these cells and how they work. That was the turning point that led me to become interested in neuroscience.”

Another role for the scientist – Awareness Days
According to the Mexican researcher it is a common stigma that people with mental illnesses are to blame themselves for their condition. Something that does not happen as often with physical illnesses. He sees the role as a scientist also to work towards eliminating those stigmas: “I would like to do these awareness days on mental health or work on mental health, not only from this academic stage where I am now, academic research, articles and all that, but I think it is something I would like to develop in the future. Well, we study mental illnesses on a biochemical and neurophysiological level, but we are also aware that we have another problem, which we can also attack from our place as a scientist, right? OK, we do science, we do laboratory science, we go to congresses, but there is also a human side that we sometimes forget, we sometimes leave it aside,” says Hiram.

Social stigma of mental illnesses
The Mexican researcher is also really worried about the social stigma he sees towards mental illnesses: “At the university level we are very used to hearing words like “you’re tired”. Hey, you have a lot of homework? We start to normalize having an anxiety attack or having an episode of depression as a normal part of being a university student, instead of seeking professional help,” says Hiram and continues: “The primary stigma associated with mental illness is denial. Believing that they do not exist or that no treatment (pharmacological or psychological) is necessary only exacerbates the condition. Also, some words used in mental illness diagnosis carry a negative social connotation. A clear example is schizophrenia, as this term is often used to describe people who speak or act nonsensically,” says the Mexican researcher.
He points out how Latin American countries, like his homeland, are falling behind on several points, for instance regarding diagnosis of mental illnesses. “The diagnosis of mental illnesses is purely clinical, without any laboratory or imaging tests to help to confirm it. This sometimes makes de diagnosis ambiguous and, consequently, the treatment as well. A contrasting example can be drawn with diabetes mellitus. A patient may present with symptoms of the disease. However, the disease is confirmed with a blood laboratory test that assesses the patient’s glucose metabolism and confirms the diagnosis. In many countries in Europe and the United States some specific risk factors (both, genetic and environmental ones) for mental illnesses have been detected which makes the diagnosis more specific. But in countries like Mexico we don’t have that. And so, it is like a little snowball with mental illnesses that is growing, the lack of a precise and exact diagnosis, and so, it is like a little snowball with mental illnesses that is growing”.
And that again, obviously, has consequences for giving the right treatment: “The treatment is often not the right one, and these treatments have been acting on the same thing since the 60s. They only change the way in which it is dosed, but in the field of mental illnesses, there have not been treatments that are specifically disruptive. Well in depression, yes, currently we know a lot about ketamine which has a fast action on the symptoms of depression and curiously it has been shown that it seems that its activity as a fast-acting antidepressant is because it acts at the level of brain plasticity. This is still under debate, but I think that is the tip of the iceberg on plasticity and mental illnesses, I think we already have a panorama of plasticity in mental illnesses, which is very promising,” says Hiram.

Disparity in access to new drugs and powerful microscopes And being able to research on the human brain is quite a big challenge, says the Mexican scientist: “Studying plasticity in patients still has many technical limitations. We don’t have equipment that allows us to see this plasticity in real time, like an echocardiogram. There we can see the function of the heart in real time under different conditions. Plasticity is still inaccessible to us in a patient, hence the importance of animal models to study this, because these models allow us to see plasticity in real time, from proteins that are in the synapse, to the behavior of the animal. It allows us to create a mapping of what might be happening with this plasticity at both physiological and pathological levels and that has led us to understand, what is its role in neurodevelopment and also, what is its probable error in the pathophysiology of mental illnesses that is happening in these people at the level of plasticity.”
“I think the biggest challenge is that in general, neuroscience is a field that is very much in vogue all over . But in countries like Mexico, which do not have an infrastructure and do not have large budgets for these new technologies for the study of the brain, new developed technologies are somewhat inaccessible here. Mainly because it’s expensive, these devices, for example, there are microscopes (multiphoton ones) in which we could see plasticity in real time with very innovative techniques. Well, we don’t have the capacity to buy that microscope, I think that in Mexico there must be a few multiphoton microscopes in the whole country. And well, there are universities, that is the equipment that they have in the United States here in Europe that just one university has two or three of these microscopes. So, that is the disparity we are facing”.

For Hiram in some sense it is all about funding: “Ultimately, it all boils down to money: having it allows you to conduct and publish cutting-edge research (as publishing a research paper can cost up to 2000 USD), while lacking it keeps you in the shadow of those who can.” Due to budget constraints, collaboration with other groups is essential to carry out projects, according to Hiram. He has conducted research in collaboration with groups not only in the same university but also from other national universities, including UNAM, IPN, CINVESTAV as well as international universities such as Complutense University of Madrid in Spain.

But the disparity is not only negative, insist Hiram: “That also opens up an opportunity for us to do things that are more creative, what I mainly think can be an advantage in this initial part of my career as an independent researcher is precisely to postulate new models to interrupt neurodevelopment that have relevance at the clinical level. So, we don’t have access to these great tools, but we are motivated by creativity to be able, for example, to generate some animal models that do not involve, well, more than the purchase of a drug. O making models that have to do with the environment, for example stress as a risk factor, that allow us to generate things so that mental illnesses can be studied”.

Lise Josefsen Hermann met Hiram Tendilla Beltran at the annual Lindau Nobel Laureate meeting 2023. Lise is a freelance journalist based in Latin America for more than a decade. She is a Pulitzer Grantee, works for the investigative media Danwatch and has published in media like Al Jazeera, BBC, Deutsche Welle, Danish Broadcasting Corporation, El Pais, New York Times, and Undark Magazine

Indigenous Empowerment – The Kankuamo People in Colombia Communicate About Themselves

Lise Josefsen Hermann — Tue, 10 Jan 2023 19:09:47 +0000

Discrimination and stereotypes. Indigenous peoples are often misunderstood in the media, which is why the Kankuamo people from Colombia decided to strengthen their communication skills: to be able to tell their own stories to a broader audience. And they have done so in collaboration with a regional department of the National University of Colombia.

Entering the indigenous community of Chemesquemena as outsiders, the first thing we are led to is a big stone sharing the same name as the community, Chemesquemena, a holy place of the indigenous Kankuamo people.

We must cleanse our energy before entering, and let go of our negative experiences and preoccupations, whatever we are bringing with us. We sit, facing the big powerful stone together with Carolina Mercedes Arias, the Mayora – the elder female spiritual leader of the place.

”What worries you, how are you doing at the moment?” she asks. A bit confusing when you are mostly focused on your own interviews, and what you are going to ask her about.

She is also very much leading the way, deciding the order of the things: When I can ask which questions, and how to respect their indigenous culture and way of thinking. Well, that is what this whole visit is about, really.

Before we continue with the Kankuamos, let us take a small detour to the recently opened La Paz campus at the National University in Colombia – in the Cesar department in the northern part of the country. When the university defined the strategic lines for this department, one of the lines of research prioritized was overcoming the war and building peace in the territories.

This part of Colombia has been hard hit by decades of armed conflict, and the Kankuamo people are no exception. Their indigenous language had practically been lost as a result of many Kankuamos being victims of forced displacement. Later, they began to recover their cultural identity and ancestral knowledge using modern communication tools, such as radio and video.

Anthropologist, Professor Lucía Eufemia Meneses Lucumí, directs the Territorial Peace Laboratory at the La Paz Campus. The objective of the Laboratory is to contribute to nation-building and sustainable peace from the territories. Working with communication from indigenous people like the Kankuamo is a part of that.

Dr. Lucumí is something as rare, at least in a Colombian context, an indigenous researcher, belonging to the Nasa-people, which consists of nearly 200.000 persons originating from the departments Cauca and Huila. ”I think that all the institutions and victims’ organizations have found in the university a strategic ally that they can count on because we are impartial and for this issue of the conflict, impartiality is needed,” she says.

Indigenous culture threatened by the armed conflict
A part of the Territorial Peace Laboratory’s work is about making their communicative process visible, including managing their own TV, Radio, social media, and for example the podcast ‘El mochilón de la Sierra’, the library of Kankuamo and Chicote music.

“One of the big problems, when we think of indigenous people in the country, is thinking that all the indigenous people from the highlands are the same, and people say too much stigmatizing like these indigenous are all the same. Part of the work we have done in the Academy is to look at the details of each group, understand their histories, understand what they face and so forth, and that is done very well in the university with small groups,” says Dr. Lucumí.

Let us now return to the Kankuamo in the Chemesquemena district in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. The Kankuamo resguardo consists of 13 indigenous communities. Resguardos in Colombia are collective indigenous territories according to the Constitution. The Mayora Carolina Mercedes Arias recalls the hard times they went through years back, when the armed conflict was at its highest:

”It was a very difficult time; there were guerrillas, there were paramilitariesIndi, the army was in the middle, our girls were also raped, they were also killed by one group as well as the other, it was very difficult. At that time, we had a lot of violence here in our territory. If we were up here, we could not go down, if we were down there, we could not go up. But today, we are getting over it and stronger again, as a people.” So says this female spiritual leader of the Kankuamo people.

As a result of the conflict, many Kankuamo – as well as other Colombians – were displaced from their territory. Something really painful, Arias recalls: “It was a very difficult moment in the displacement when I had to leave my territory immediately, it was not easy. But today, I thank my mother and my spiritual fathers that I feel so strengthened and so proud to have returned to my territory to strengthen our identity, the traditional part, and the spiritual part, which has been very strong for me,” she says.

And to begin to communicate their culture, to tell their story and stories using modern audiovisual media and social media, is a part of living with the trauma and strengthening their indigenous culture: “What we want is to strengthen our culture, so that there is no persecution of the indigenous peoples because we feel discriminated against. For instance, they say that those Indians up there are predators, but we are the opposite, we are caretakers of the nature of the Sierra, of the sacred sites of our culture”.

The female communicators planned five videos to tell the most important part of their culture from their own perspectives.

“The idea was to use them to strengthen our culture in the traditional part: In the part of music, in the part of handicrafts, in the part of the culture of how we used to cultivate the land. As a woman, it is also part of my role to take care of our children, and they should learn about these customs so that our customs do not disappear. So really the importance of making these stories, these videos, is to compile our history so that it does not end – so that our culture does not disappear,” says Arias.

“The idea is that one day our children, our grandchildren, will see the videos so that we continue to strengthen our culture. Let’s not be ashamed to say that we are indigenous here when we are, but we should say it with that pride. And for that reason, we ask not to be discriminated against because we are not savages, we are good people and we also deserve respect”, says Arias.

For example, o ne of the videos is a story of the kankuamo mochila, a type of woven bag used by everyone, and the importance of these for the recovery of the community after the armed conflict.

Just nearby the sacred stone where we were cleansed before entering the village flows the Guatapuri river. Together with Sibelis Villazon Cáceres, 39, coordinator of the indigenous women’s commission of the Kankuamo people, we take a moment here beside the water.

“One important role of the indigenous woman is this transmission of knowledge. If I want to guide my child along that good path, that is our important role, because, for us, we are territory, everything we have in our body is in the territory. That spiritual order that was left from our beginnings is what makes us different, that is why we are indigenous. Because we have to take care of the water, we have to take care of the mountains. We have to take care of the thunder. We have to take care of what we have here, it is our safeguard. For us to live well is to live with what we have. For me, as a women’s coordinator, this has been of the utmost importance,” Cáceres explains.

To her, the National University is a very important ally for them as an indigenous people:

“We are looking for a strategy, to learn and unlearn and also to empower ourselves. That’s why I feel that the advocacy that we have been doing with the university itself has also been very important. Our students who are there can also contribute to us. In this process of recovery of our culture, the alliances that we can always manage between ourselves, with those people who value and are always thinking about safeguarding the indigenous peoples, are really important. It is another way of reaching our people, our women, and our families for their own good and looking for ways to empower them with the information. Because the videos also seek to sow concern,” says Cáceres.

Communication by indigenous to avoid discrimination in the media
We visit the community’s local indigenous radio station, Tayrona Stereo, and they all talk proudly about the newly produced videos about the Kankuamo culture. The women participated on all levels, from choosing the topics to filming, interviewing, and editing. Delvis Esther Estrada Arias, 48, is the leader of the Kankuamo communication team and has participated in the creation of five videos about her culture and people. They were all directed by women.

”I think that this is very profound because we do it with all our feelings, from ourselves for ourselves, from our vision. We know what we want to bring to our people and we know how to do it so that our people understand it. I think we will understand each other better in that sense. What happens is that you know that everyone understands each other among their people, don’t you? We put in that feeling, that appropriation, that affection. It is not the same as in your village and I go and talk to them, it is not the same,” explains Arias.

She also tells about how they, as indigenous people, have experienced discrimination and misunderstandings from the local press: ”Unfortunately, I have already seen it at the local level. It’s that suddenly there are many teams of rather tabloid journalists. Well, I don’t know, there hasn’t been empathy. We have some of my local radio stations and newspapers, one could even say that they even discriminate against us and even judge us, so we don’t have confidence in these journalists anymore,” she says.

It is clear how indigenous peoples in Colombia are getting empowered. Traditionally, there is not a very strong indigenous movement in Colombia in comparison to for instance Bolivia or Ecuador, where they play an important role in national politics. Also, a much smaller part of the population is indigenous here: in Colombia, it is less than five percent.

After visiting the Kankuamo community in la Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, I assist in an event in the La Paz department of the National University in Valledupar. One of the participants is a Mamo – a highly respected spiritual leader – from the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta. Just seeing him wandering around on campus seems a big step toward including the country’s indigenous population in the academic world. Somehow, the spiritual way of perceiving the world seems far from the academic perspective. We are discussing how to communicate about indigenous peoples and cultures; stereotypes and the importance of having indigenous communicators. It is as if the distance from the big sacred stone and the reflections in the water of the river up in the Sierra Nevada to the University campus has all of a sudden become a lot shorter.

Lise Josefsen Hermann – a freelance journalist based in Latin America for more than a decade. She is a Pulitzer Grantee, works for the investigative media Danwatch and has published in media like Al Jazeera, BBC, Deutsche Welle, Danish Broadcasting Corporation, El Pais, New York Times, and Undark Magazine. Photos: Charlie Cordero, Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, Colombia

“Up here, it is as if the pandemic did not exist”

Lise Josefsen Hermann — Wed, 29 Dec 2021 15:06:50 +0000

Seeing the capital from up here, in the hills high above the rooftops, our perspective changes. The distance is small, but mentally, this is another world. We’re in the neighbourhood of El Pilar – in the outskirts of Quito, high in the green mountains that surround the city. People in this area are traditionally farmers, and now, most of them are elderly.

José Antonio Cayancela Vargas (75), lives here with his sister Rosa Cayancela (73) and his seventeen dogs. They have spent the pandemic with each other in their home in the El Pilar neighborhood, on the outskirts of Quito. Quito-Ecuador. A world with no mobile phone coverage. With no internet. A high place where the pandemic doesn’t seem to have reached. He suffers from some stressful mental health issues.

José Cayancela (75), a resident of the El Pilar neighborhood in the outskirts of Quito. He is one of the elderly who live alone and have experienced the pandemic in the same way. Quito-Ecuador. Andrés Yépez.

In earlier days he worked on the farms. The area produces potatoes, barley, and lima beans. Some time ago he began suffering from varicosed legs, so he has trouble walking, and being able to do work. ”The effect of my illness and my age has been crushing,” says José Antonio, surrounded by his pack of loving dogs. “But isn’t the scenery beautiful?” he asks, pointing down at the city.

The only way to reach El Pilar is on foot. It can take up to two hours, depending on your pace, and your health. José Antonio recalls the arrival of COVID-19 to Ecuador in early 2020. ”Then this pandemic appeared. I don’t know why. Apparently, it came to enslave us. To dominate us, the poor. What do I know?” Meanwhile, during March and April 2020 the Ecuadorian coastal city of Guayaquil became the Latin-American epicentre of the pandemic. Pictures of unburied bodies lying in the streets circulated worldwide. But this green mountain spot, high above Quito, has been a safe haven. ”Luckily the pandemic did not reach us here,” says José Antonio. “It was worrying. I thought that maybe I would get infected. And what about us who live alone? But thank God that hasn’t happened. And now we have been vaccinated,” says José Antonio.

For him the pandemic represents hard economic consequences for the poorest: ”The poor are out of work. Companies fired their workers without compensation or anything. So – I think it’s a pretext to rob folk of their jobs, and leave them in poverty. This has happened not only here in Ecuador, but also all over the world. I think that some rich businessman invented this for his own convenience.” He sits on the grass, with his seventeen dogs, looking down over the city of Quito, that seems so quiet from up here.

And José Antonio and his family do know all about poverty. He was born in a hacienda, where his parents worked their whole life as serfs, modern slaves. When he was six his father died, and José Antonio came to live here with his elder siblings.

The “mayor” of the neighbourhood, Mery Torres, has been gathering donations for this area’s inhabitants during the pandemic. Today a small group of volunteers from the posh district of nearby Cumbaya have made it up, doling out food for José Antonio and his neighbours. They have been doing so every second week for quite some time now. “So that the elderly people should not risk leaving home,” Mery Torres explains, “Going out for food, or for work. Because down there in Quito, things are quite tough, and many people died. We could not let them take that risk.”

We return to José Antonio. When asked about what worries him he explains that other things have priorities.“We have been living our whole lives here, and the authorities have forgotten about us up in these farming areas. For starters, building a road to reach us, just to get our produce down.”

So, for now, José Antonio and his neighbours can only walk down to the city. An endeavour, that takes this seventy five year old, with his tired varicosed legs, a couple of hours. “And if there are any emergencies, pandemic-related or not, no ambulance can get here.”

“If something happens to someone, hard luck. They would just die, as there is no road, and no way to call an ambulance! But with a road, yes, the ambulance could come,” says José Antonio, simply.

And then there is the problem with communications. In Ecuador, according to Ecuador’s National Statistics Institute, by 2019, over 45% of households nationwide had Internet access. However, people aged 65 and older represent only 18% of users who have a smartphone. José Antonio shows us his “smartphone”. “It stopped working some two years ago,” he tells me. Anyway, he wasn’t familiar with using it for the internet. “And there is hardly any mobile coverage up here in El Pilar.” “It is a bit difficult with all communication around here. And this internet thing? – It’s mostly for the young people”.

On the back of José Antonios phone is a sticker with his number written on it. He shows an old Nokia too – but the line for it has apparently been cancelled.

He tells how the office of his electricity company closed due to the pandemic. Since he and the other elderly inhabitants in El Pilar are not familiar using the internet – which became the common way to pay the bills, and everything in general, they now have problems paying. Nowadays he must visit a pharmacy to pay, where they charge extra for this service.

Walking up the mountain path, with a strong pace, is José Antonio’s older sister, Maria Concepción Cayancela, now eighty three years old. “The piercing cold wind up here has damaged my hearing,” she claims. Her voice is strong and loud. It is difficult to maintain a conversation with her, but yet her face expresses her thoughts, very clearly – showing an optimistic mindset.

María Concepción Cayancela (83) has lived alone all the pandemic in her house in the outskirts of Quito. El Pilar neighborhood is located in the foothills of one of the hills surrounding downtown Quito. She goes out every so often to collect grass to feed her animals. Quito-Ecuador. Photo:Andrés Yépez.

“For me, it is as if the pandemic did not exist,” she says, and laughs. “God is taking care of us.” Maria bore five children. One died at twenty four years old in a traffic accident. Her surviving children and grandchildren worry about her in these troubled times – and advise her not to venture out. But she is stubborn, and has her own free will. “I went to the marketplace during the quarantine. I just walked there. They took my temperature at the entrance, and then allowed me in. Every week or two I go and buy some things there. And look – nothing has happened to me. I have a facemask, you know, just in case,” Maria explains, and laughs loudly again. “My daughters try to prevent me going down to the centre. But as they are working, they don’t even know that I go there. “ Mother, don’t you dare go down there!” my children and grandchildren would say. But I am not afraid of the pandemic. It is just like the wind,” says the eighty three year old female farmer.

She starts off by herself, joking about the pandemic, and it’s causes: “Of course, you will catch diseases, when they walk around like they do, almost naked, even if it’s cold,” she says, referring to younger people’s fashion, “Bareing all that skin!” And she repeats her version of this airborne virus: “If it’s just the wind, why is everyone so scared?”

However, for the old lady, this time has been a depressing period. She recalls her visit down to town during the strictest part of the quarantine: “The city looked sad! It was sad. Like a ghost town, where everyone’s departed. As if all the people had passed away. It was very sad.” For once Maria’s face clouds over with a serious expression. “The people were all covered when they walked around. It is like life, without life”.

“That’s it, the story is over.” Maria’s last words hang there, blowing in the wind, high above the city of Quito, while she continues with her strong legs, uphill.

Photos by Andrés Yépez. Story by Lise Josefsen Hermann – a freelance journalist based in Latin America for more than a decade. She specializes in environmental issues and climate change, human rights, indigenous peoples, migration and more. She is a Pulitzer Grantee and her work has been published with media like Al Jazeera, BBC, Deutsche Welle, Danish Broadcasting Corporation, Danish Development Research Network, El Pais, New York Times, and Undark Magazine.

Also read: Older people in Denmark were mostly worried about other people getting infected with COVID-19 and COVID-19’s extra torture on Kenya’s elderly

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Sex-workers in Ecuador badly affected by the economic aftermath of COVID-19

Lise Josefsen Hermann — Wed, 10 Nov 2021 11:31:29 +0000

Characterized by old, white colonial style buildings, the historical center of Quito is recognized as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO and normally well visited by tourists – foreign as well as national. It has also become infamous for insecurity reasons, issues with drug and alcohol use in the streets and theft. And then it is one of the areas where you find sex workers offering their services on the streets.

In Quito there are special places, hotels, destined for the sex-workers and their clients. It is only permitted for the workers to offer their services here. If they go with their client to other places, for instance other hotels, those often get closed.

This group has been facing many hard challenges during the years, prohibition, discrimination, health risks etc. and on top of all that, came the COVID-19 pandemic. One thing was the illness per se – but the hardest problem came later. We will get back to that shortly.

Rogelia, 47, who uses that name while on job, has been working as a sex worker in this area for the past twenty years. She lives with her husband, and they have four children. As other colleagues she recalls a historical moment for sex workers in Quito back in 2015. After strong police operatives, Quito’s sex workers – including Rogelia – went demonstrating on the streets, claiming their rights to work legally. The ended up with an agreement with the municipality, allowing these specific hotels as workplaces. Before that, it was tough, Rogelia remembers:

“We could not stand more than five minutes on the same spot without the police harassing us. They would beat us up or take us to the detention,” says Rogelia.

Another result from 2015 is the creating of several organizations, uniting the women and transwomen depending on the sectors in the city where they are working. Rogelia is part of the organization “24 de Mayo.”

Before pandemic times she would work all seven days a week from around 9 am to 18 or 21 in the evening. “I like to be on the street.” She walks around, sits, talks with colleagues, enters their hotel for a while. And so would her day go. She would make 2-3 or 4 points (punto) as they call it. For each point she earns 10 USD (which is the currency in Ecuador). The service costs 13 USD – three dollars go to the bed / the hotel.

But then came COVID-19 and nothing has been the same for Rogelia and the other sex workers.

“It is hard for me to make a point now. Now I am lucky if I make one point during the whole day. Sometimes I make nothing”.

With the arrival of COVID-19 to Ecuador in March 2020, Rogelia and the other sex workers were told not to go out, they where not allowed to work on the street.

“They told us it would last one week. Then I called the president of our organization and asked – can I go out now? I felt I was going to die, staying at home, I don’t like to stay at the house. Then after a week the food I had bought for my home ran out. At that moment I lived with my children, two of my daughters-in-law and my grandchildren. We had already been eating small portions for the food to last longer. “

Monica, 40, has been president for the organization “24 de mayo” the six years it has existed. “After the first week it was great suffering for our members. Many began to call me, they did not have food for their children,” says Monica.

Then she and the rest of the organization began to look for donations and Rogelia and her family was able to get food again, even though she was obliged to stay at home – “Quedateencasa” as was the message in Spanish.

Then began the quarantine pandemic meals which for Rogelia was rice, eggs, and tuna from a tin. Until this day, if she has bad moments, with few clients, that is still the menu.

She says, she was not afraid of COVID-19 – she believes to have had it, experienced several of the symptoms like fever, dry cough, and strong bone-pain – but she did not get tested at that moment to confirm or not.

According to the president Monica, some 15 of the 68 sex workers from her organization has been registered as having had COVID-19.

For four months Quito’s sex workers were forced to stay at home, forced to not work.

In the end Rogelia got desperate. “The last two weeks I really needed the money. I walked for hours, from the dawn to go meet some clients”.

The clients would contact her via mobile, she could make two or three clients during a morning. She had to go home early to not be caught by the curfew that at some moment began at 2pm.

Rogelia did not get problems with the police, but other colleagues did – they were brought to detention for not respecting the quarantine.

“They were more afraid of seeing their children dying from hunger, than from COVID-19,” explains the president of the sex worker organization.

Others were kicked out from their homes – against the law – because they were not able to pay the rent. But even though the pandemic meant hard times – what came later, has been even worse:

“It is a lot harder now than during the hardest moment of the pandemic”, says Rogelia.

After three months the sex workers would have permit to work again for limited hours per day. The organizations developed protocols for implementing biosecurity measures. That was a condition from the municipality for permitting the workers to return to their work.

The women would use double facemasks all the time and often clean with medical alcohol.

“Now I am honestly a bit tired of using the facemask, Rogelia recons. Sometimes I take it of now. But I never allow the client to do so,” she says.

As a part of the protocol, the organizations also identified positions that are safer. Like doggy style, legs on the shoulder or on the edge of the bed. The idea is that the two are either not face to face – or with a certain distance. But not all the clients were happy about these new rules, tells Rogelia:

“Some said they don’t like it, that they want it the normal way. Sometimes I would allow other positions, and charge more, take advantage of the situation. They would pay me 5 or 10 dollars more for that. They also offered to pay more to take of their facemask, but I would never allow that!”

The president agrees that it is difficult to implement those new rules with the clients.

“The clients they are not used to us making the rules, there is still a lot of machismo (sexism), I want to do it my way. They don’t want to use the facemask. Some clients want to make their routine with the positions, like always. Some will just leave if they can’t get it as they want,” says Monica.

The workers of the organization make rapid-COVID-tests once a month to try to prevent them from working being COVID-19 positive.

As it has happened with several so-called vulnerable groups, during the pandemic the sex workers have been pointed out as infection points. In Ecuador there was for instance a report in the television talking about how places with sex workers would be COVID-19 infection points.

“For everyone us sex workers are always the bad ones. The ones spreading illnesses,” says Rogelia.

Time has passed, worldwide we have adopted to this so-called new reality, but normality has not yet arrived at the work situation for the sex workers in Ecuador.

“It is really difficult the situation now, there are not a lot of clients. After the DELTA variant came here, a lot became more scared. Even the young colleagues – who normally earns better – sometimes do not have one single client during a whole day”.

Rogelia shows her COVID-19 vaccination card, laminated. It has become normal for the clients to ask her if she is vaccinated. She laughs, relaxed. “But they never bring their card to show to me!”

Also, the profile of Rogelia’s clients has made it more complicated for her during the pandemic. Many of them are older – or were. “They don’t go out, they take extra care, because they are older. And also, some of my older clients have died with COVID-19,” says Rogelia.

Then there is the economic aspect. Everyone is in crisis, so people won’t have money to require the services with Rogelia provides, if they barely have enough to buy food.

The president is worried about the situation:

“The economic crisis is global – not only for sex workers. Imagine spending 13 USD for a moment of pleasure, well knowing, that those 13 dollars can be spend at your home. Then they prefer not spending extra. Our service is like a luxury, that is cut off in times of crisis,” says Monica.

According to Monica and Rogelia they calculate their work to have gone down with some 50-80 % caused by the pandemic. And looking for some other income is really hard too:

“Nobody wants to employ someone with my age, nearly 50. Not even for dishwashing. I am surviving only with this job, ” says Rogelia.

She hopes that December might bring better times – normally, before the pandemic, that would be a good month with gifts and so on.

Meanwhile COVID-19 is just one challenge adding up for the sex workers of Ecuador. They are also regularly facing threats of being forcedly moved away from the historical center.

Monica, the president, talks about a recent case of a man cutting a Venezuelan sex worker in her face and on her hand with a machete. “The police did not want to raise charges, because they say, that we are looking for the trouble as sex workers,” says Monica with indignation in her voice.

And then there is the all-time stigma of the work with sexual services. Rogelia’s family stopped talking with her, when they found out, that she was a sex worker. During the mentioned demonstration in 2015, Rogelia’s face came to the TV screen. As a result, her 8-year-old daughter was bullied that her mother was a whore / hooker (in Spanish: Puta).

But at the same time, Rogelia is happy about her work, she says:

“It has made it possible for me to give my children and grandchildren food and education. But I don’t tell people, that I am a sex worker normally, because most think, that we are the worst thing existing,”

Also read: “My story is embarrassing but I am giving myself another chance, after I messed up” and

Vulnerable Women Became even more Vulnerable During the Pandemic

The lost teenagers – Mary Mutesi

Lise Josefsen Hermann is a freelance journalist based in Latin America for more than a decade. She specializes in environmental issues and climate change, human rights, indigenous peoples, migration and more. She is a Pulitzer Grantee and her work has been published with media like Al Jazeera, BBC, Deutsche Welle, Danish Broadcasting Corporation, Danish Development Research Network, El Pais, New York Times, and Undark Magazine.

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Monica (40), president of the sex workers association “Primero de Mayo” in the hotel where they provide their services. Quito-Ecuador. Andrés Yépez.

Member credential of Rogelia (47), a sex worker and member of the association “Primero de Mayo” in the hotel, located in the historic center of Quito, where she provides her services. Quito-Ecuador. Andrés Yépez.

Monica (40), president of the sex workers association “Primero de Mayo” in the hotel where they provide their services. Quito-Ecuador. Andrés Yépez.

Lise Josefsen Hermann

The shark case in Colombia – including researchers in policymaking

Lise Josefsen Hermann — Tue, 09 Jun 2020 10:57:01 +0000

The recent so-called shark-case in Colombia seems to be becoming an example of positive collaboration between the academy and policymakers. Tuesday 29^th of October a resolution (000350) from the Colombian Agricultural Ministry was published, which allowed artisanal fishermen to hunt up to 125 tons of shark and another 5.2 tons of shark fins. This measure would apply to the species Carcharhinus falciformis, C limbatus, C leucas, Alopias supercilius, Galeocerdo cuvier and Sphyrna spp.

But the so-called shark-resolution rapidly had the public against it as well as also a broad range of academics and environmental organizations. The criticism was about not including the Academy in the development of fish quotas, that included the newly allowance of catching those shark species.

Short time after the new quotas were published, three private universities in Bogota, The Javariana University, The Andes University and the Rosario University, published a communique, a call to the government to include the academy.

“We considered, that it was necessary to revise the numbers of fish population, which is being regulated with the new quotas,” states Carolina Pardo Díaz, Director of the Department of Biology on the Rosario University in Bogota.

The Academy in Bogotá we among other things, worried that the allowance to establish a quota for shark fins could lead to more illegal trafficking to Asian countries. This is the first time that shark fins are included in fish quotas in Colombia. A correct calculation of the quota for sharks is primordial, because situated at the top of the food chains, the species serves an important regulator of other smaller species. If the shark population is reduced, that creates an increase of other species, which in the end puts in risk the balance of the pelagic ecosystem.

“Any calculation of quotas for the use of a species must be based on scientific information that guarantees the sustainability of the species, and the academy has that information. This is an invitation for the government to seek approaches with universities before issuing decrees on the use of biodiversity,” says Carolina Pardo Díaz.

The academics from the universities are also worried about that there was given license to catch species, that are on the UICN red list of vulnerable species.

“We have a great task to do so that people with technical knowledge reach government positions and hold decision-making positions. In addition, there is little dialogue between the two communities. We need to build those collaboration bridges and I think this statement is a step in that direction since it openly tells the government that we, as Universities, want to help the country with our human resources, infrastructure and knowledge”.

And the director of the Biology department finds it necessary to generate more research and knowledge about the fish population, to have enough scientific support.

“It was a call from the academic institutions, that the government should seek to approach universities, to establish quotas based on reality”.

Shortly after the call from the universities, the Ministry on Agriculture has just agreed on working through this again.

“This is really positive; we succeed in that the Ministry listened to the Academy. It’s not really common and a really positive exercise. In general, the academy and the government do not work in common agreement, not necessarily when the academy raises its voice, the government hears us. This case is a positive example of that it’s possible to work together”.

The Andes University, Rosario University and Javeriana University are among the top universities in Colombia, extremely powerful institutions and very respected. Many politicians and Ministers have studies here. So, when those universities make such a statement, it weighs heavily.

In other areas there are approaches on this kind of collaboration between science and policymakers. For instance, about wildlife hunting. But it has not moved as fast as the fishing quota case. Also, the way things happened with the shark-case is not the right order of things, means the director from the Biology Department:

“It is a serious mistake to issue decrees without scientific basis, and only make corrections, if the academy makes a pronouncement. The right way is to work together from the beginning”, says Carolina Pardo Díaz. The immediate response was a surprise for the Academy, and the media played an important role making the statement visible:

“This is extremely important. We have a lot of resources and knowledge in the area of biology on sustainable and responsible management. It is essential that we as an academy support this type of policies. That our knowledge doesn’t just stay only as articles but that we can support the sustainable development of society,” says Carolina Pardo Díaz.

“It is also really important this collaboration for us, to know exactly what kind of professionals that are needed to respond to the necessities in the society”, states the director of the Biology department of the Rosario University in Bogota.

A bit further north, in Panama, cooperation between science and policy makers has meant, that there was elaborated a new route for cargo ships in the Panama Channel, to make sure, that the whales could pass as well:

“It’s all about getting the right people together to solve the important problems in society together. For instance, we have excellent experts on topics as water or transportation, and most probably politicians don’t have that knowledge, they need the science,” says Maria Gabriela Alvarado, Director of Public Relations in Senacyt – National Secretary of science, technology and innovation in Panamá.

In Panama they are organizing symbiosis breakfasts. And it doesn’t have to be that complicated, Maria Gabriela Alvarado thinks: “It’s just about getting people together. Then the rest happens by itself”.

“It has been a challenge that in general, people have very little respect for and faith in politicians. Even more the Academy. So, the experts historically have little interest in working together with politicians”.

But that situation is changing which is positive for the possibility of cooperation between researchers with important knowledge and politicians, making important decisions for the country and the people.

“We have a lot of young panameños returning after having studied abroad, and they have another mindset for this kind of collaborations. They are more openminded for that,” says Maria Gabriela Alvarado from Senacyt.

Lise Josefsen Hermann is a Danish journalist based in Ecuador

Maria Gabriela Alvarado, Director of Public Relations in Senacyt Photo: Juan Zarama Perini

Carcharhinus limbatus

Carcharhinus falciformis

Galeocerdo cuvier

Galeocerdo cuvier

Colombia struggling to improve level of research

Lise Josefsen Hermann — Sun, 03 May 2020 14:22:02 +0000

He is often mentioned as the father of science-, technology- and innovation policy in Colombia.

Eduardo Posada is a Colombian physicist and president of the Colombian Association for the Advancement of Science (ACAC), a promoter of the Colombian legislation for science and technology. We meet at a café in Colombia’s capital Bogotá. Posada is more optimistic than normally. Just preparing the last details for the official creation of the new Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation, the first of its kind in history in Colombia.

”I feel optimistic, because the Ministry generates more access to the high level of the Government. And more visibility to Science and research,” states Posada.

For the experienced physicist and science-policymaker, the creation of the Ministry in December 2019 is really symbolic and creates hope:

”This is the first time, that a Government in Colombia has taken science and research seriously at this level.”

Mission de los Sabios
At the same time in December, the so-called mission of the Wise – Mission de los Sabios in Colombia – of which Eduardo Posada is Vice-president, published its recommendations after almost one year’s work. The mission was formed by 43 international experts with support from ten universities. For 300 days the experts worked on recommendations for a path towards a more sustainable development in Colombia.

Three big challenges are how to protect the country’s biodiversity, more sustainable production in Colombia and about reaching for a more equal and just country for instance within the sectors of education and health.

One of their recommendations was exactly to invest more in research. That’s one big preoccupation for Eduardo Posada. His homeland is doing well economically and on other core parameters. But on education and research, Colombia scores low for the region. According to the important indicator ACTI, which calculates investments in Science, Technology and Innovation compared to the country’s Gross Domestic Product, GDB, Colombia scored in 2018 only 0,61 % on ACTI. As a comparation OECD countries normally invests 2 % on ACTI.

“Colombia is really low on these investigation-indicators also compared to other countries in the region,” says Eduardo Posada.

The Mission of the Wise came with recommendations on areas like Alternative Energies, Health, Creative Industries (Orange economy), Drinking Water, Climate Change and several others.

This is the second Mission of the Wise which Colombia has had – the first one in was back in 1994, with participation of the Nobel Prize winner of Literature, Gabriel Garcia Marquez – and of which Eduardo Posada also took part. A total of ten people was part of the country’s first Mission of the Wise 25 years ago.

Research is fundamental for development of a country
With the opening of the new Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation, this special moment for Colombian Science and Research also is expected to be reflected in the Government’s response to the Missions recommendations:

”President Iván Duque has said, that he will follow the recommendations of the Mission and he will make it 1,5 % ACTI and ID close to 1 %,” states Eduardo Posada.

For the scientist and ”Father of research-policy in Colombia”, prioritizing science is extremely important for development in a country like his motherland:

”Research is fundamental for well-being/welfare and development of a society. We have many problems in Colombia on which we need solutions found here.”

And it is important, that the science developed in each country responds to specific needs and characteristics of the country. Because otherwise the topics might not be investigated at all or not prioritized adequately:

”Pharmaceutical companies they don’t care about illness that we only have here. It’s not worth it for them to do research on such an area. So, we must assure that for our side, from the State.”

And also, on environmental issues research developed in Colombia is of much value for Posada:

”Colombia is the second most biodiverse place on earth. We must study our biodiversity – what do we do, to take care of it? It can also be to study fruits or vegetables, that we only have in this region. So, it’s necessary that we as a nation study them.”

In the early days of Eduardo Posadas career, he participated in developing production of instant coffee near Manizales in the Colombian coffee region. An extremely important area for the country being the world’s second largest coffee producer in the world. One example of the importance of prioritizing research on country-specific issues.

”Also equipment, it’s necessary to invest in equipment, that works under our conditions, can be humidity, altitude, temperature etc. And in Colombia there is also a big need for studies within social sciences within our context of the armed conflict etc.”

The Ministry opening has yet to prove if it comes together with improved prioritising within science, technology and innovation – if the President as promised will follow the recommendations of the Mission of the Wise.

Lise Josefsen Hermann is a Danish journalist based in Ecuador

PERSPECTIVAS JUL 23 2019 E. POSADA FLÓREZ

EDUARDO POSADA #MISIÓNDESABIOS 2019

Female scientist fighting for her place studying climate change in Ecuador

Lise Josefsen Hermann — Sun, 29 Mar 2020 09:24:17 +0000

Meet the Ecuadorian scientist who defied machismo-culture in the academic world in Ecuador, to study thoroughly a big passion for her – climate change and its effects on her native mountain region and in the end the water supply in the country.

The impressive glacier of Antisana (5.758 meters) rests just above the temperature chambers, that represents some of the climate change field study-work for Priscilla Muriel (44), Associate Professor at Pontificia Universidad Católica del Ecuador. In this remote mountain region, in the national park around the volcano Antisana, Priscilla and her colleagues study how rising temperatures affects the highland ecosystem in the Andes – on the soil, the plants and as a community of plants.

The site is one of the so-called Gloria sites in Ecuador, which are also found around the volcanos El Altar and Pichincha. In total there are 21 Gloria-spots in Latin America from Venezuela to Argentina, and they are part of the global observation research initiative in alpine environments.

The Ecuadorian biologist got her Ph.D. in Biology at Aarhus University with support from the ENRECA program. She forms part of a group of female scientists at her university in Ecuador.

Even though she belongs to the younger parts of the scientists, as a woman she has had many challenges related to her sex.

“You’re here at the university just to find a husband, a professor told me once – as all the other women,” remembers Priscilla with a serious smile.

She tells how the first years of her career she spent behind the desk more doing a kind of analyzing others field work. “It was my perception and I was suggested to do deskwork – because field studies were not for women,” Priscilla explains.

Her personal fight and experiences have also made Priscilla passionate about supporting other women in science. “Otherwise imagine all the knowledge that gets lost. And all those female scientists not being able to realize important work,” states Priscilla.

Back at Antisana national park at high above sea level and with a humid and cold climate, the scientist is showing some boxes 2×2 meters that simulates how 2 degrees warming would affect the environment.

“When the temperature rises, some of the original plants from the páramo ecosystem die out and make space for species from lower altitudes, even for invasive species. And these are a lot stronger and more aggressive. In general, those ones outcompete the native plants. In Ecuador this phenomenon hasn’t really been studied, we are still in diapers. But from other parts of the world we know, that in those small niches, open spaces, if there is an invasive plant, the probability that a native plant will germinate, is very low. Then in some years, you will find a community of plants that doesn’t look like the original one at all. And the ecosystem will not have the same features that allow CO2 capture or water storage – it’s like a snowball”.

Also, when the páramo plants die back and invasive species get in, suddenly you no longer have the same food for animals (pollinators, native herbivores). It’s a problem with some invasive species, that they are not very palatable for animals that eats small plants. Furthermore, you do not have the same resource for insects or birds who live in the here and acts as pollinators or seed dispersers for páramos species for crops further down the mountain.

“The páramo and its community of plants is like a super developed network that we just know a tiny bit about”.

The páramo ecosystems are often referred to as water factories, and important for the supply of drinking water. Antisana is no exception. This particular area is essential to ensure water supplies for the Ecuadorian capital, Quito. “And we don’t understand very well what’s happening here with the rising temperatures and this is really serious,” warns Priscilla.

“That’s what motivates me. The plants of the high Andes – that don’t exist elsewhere. If we don’t act, so that those plants won’t disappear, those species are condemned. Rising temperatures causes the plants to migrate higher up – but those plants can’t any higher here, because they are already near the top of the mountains.”

But as a scientist specialized in climate change, it is also an ever-existing challenge understanding the seriousness of the situation without losing hope or suffering psychological consequences of that knowledge.

“It’s a beautiful work, but very slow and distressing from the point of view that you only have little pieces of a puzzle that you are just starting to discover, and then you have to try to explain what is happening to other people, specially to the decisionmakers. Generally, they do not follow you very well. And they don’t give it the relevance they should,” says Priscilla.

As the global temperature rises the plants that are exclusive for the highlands migrate up the mountain. Those páramo plants have special characteristics, such as the ability of retaining water and therefore have a central role in the clean water “production” in Andean countries such as Ecuador, Colombia etc.

“The problem is that here in the páramos, we have a super delicate balance of plants like cushion-plants and grasslands. In our study sites, what we do is to register everything! From every new plant that has arrived, to the plants we can see have disappeared, because that will give you an idea of how the community has changed and gives you an idea if the community is losing properties such as water retention”.

Priscilla is especially interested in studying climate change effects on the unique plant species in the in the Andean highlands, which urgently requires studies. And in order to get a more integral view of its consequences of climate change on the plants in the high Andes.

As a part of their studies about climate change, Priscilla and her team also register the temperature in the soil every hour. And they have been doing so for six years.

“Here in the Andes you have a lot of people who depend on the mountains for everything. Quito is the clear example with respect to water. Actually, a lot of food that we eat, is cultivated in the highlands. At the crop level, not many studies have been done – there are studies in cocoa, there are studies in potatoes, but basically all the crops from the Andean areas are poorly studied, and eventually they will have problems due to climate change,” explains Priscilla.

Priscilla has a 5 years old daughter. As a parent, it’s also hard to continue with the fieldwork and travels. But at the same time, her daughter’s future motivates Priscilla to keep investigating this important topic:

“I want my daughter to be able to enjoy and visit the same places as I have,” says Priscilla.

Lise Josefsen Hermann is a Danish journalist based in Ecuador

Photo: Esteban Barrera

References

Cuesta, Francisco, Luis Llambí, Christian Huggel, Fabian Drenkhan, William Gosling, Priscilla Muriel, Ricardo Jaramillo Terán, and Carolina Tovar Ingar. 2019. “New Land in the Neotropics: A Review of Biotic Community, Ecosystem and Landscape Transformations in the Face of Climate and Glacier Change.” Regional Environmental Change, May, 1–20. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10113-019-01499-3.

Cuesta, Francisco, Carolina Tovar Ingar, Luis Llambí, William, William Gosling, Stephan Halloy, Julieta Carilla, et al. 2020. “Thermal Niche Traits of High Alpine Plant Species and Communities across the Tropical Andes and Their Vulnerability to Global Warming.” Journal of Biogeography 47 (January): 408–20. https://doi.org/10.1111/jbi.13759.

“Our water depends on these places – and we still don’t understand well, exactly how”

Lise Josefsen Hermann — Fri, 15 Nov 2019 11:38:04 +0000

Maria Elena Gutierrez-Lagoueyte, a young ecologist, from the Colombian city Medellin, studies in detail the plants of the páramos (the moorlands). She studies the plants in order to understand how the unique Andean ecosystem plays a central role in the water cycle, providing the drinking water for around 40 million people in South America. But we do not know how exactly those moorland plants function.

Over our heads flies a couple of impressive condors. From one side to another, they get closer still. A very special moment in the National Park Los Nevados, located west of the Colombian capital, Bogota. A smiling woman is walking through the tall vegetation. We’re surrounded by rocky and snowy mountains, the altitude around here is almost 4 kms. Ecologist Maria Elena Gutierrez-Lagoueyte (35) is on her way to make plant samples of some of the specific paramo plants. The most emblematic might be the Frailejones – Espeletia. Also, the so-called cushion plants are very typical for this ecosystem, which can be found in the páramos. Both plants serve as important water filters in the páramo.

Currently, this Colombian conservation biologist is working on a PhD on páramo resiliency at the National University in Bogota, at the same time as she works at a professor at the Department of Environmental Engineering, Antioquia School of Engineering in Medellin, Colombia.

In this National Park Los Nevados, the water resources connected here provides drinking water to 8 to 10 million people in Colombia. That is almost ¼ of the entire population of Colombia. And in general páramos are providing around 70% the drinking water in Colombia.

“We’re trying to understand the páramos, the moorlands. We know, that those ecosystems are essential to natural production of drinking water, but we don’t understand, exactly how”, Maria Elena Gutierrez-Lagoueyte says. Studying moorlands in Colombia makes a lot of sense: This Andean country is home to around half of the páramos in the world.

There is a small group of students joining Maria Elena Gutierrez-Lagoueyte and Daniel Ruiz Carrascal at this field trip. The passion is easy to notice. Everyone stays up late studying the plant samples that have been collected during the day. Everyone wants to go and see the glaciers. “Before it’s too late, before they disappear completely”.

The local inhabitant, Albeiro Mayorga Orjuela, is one example of that. Having walked the páramos for several decades, he transmits the stored experiences and oral knowledge: How people remember what things used to be like, how it used to rain, and which plants used to grow where. Important information for the scientists trying to get an understanding of climate change and its effects on the ecosystem.

“The conditions for studying climate change are difficult, because here in Colombia studies last normally for 2-3 years. But it doesn’t make sense to study climate change within such a short timeframe. We have been studying climate change here for 15 years, trying to create the necessary continuity but within different projects. The moorlands are warming as fast as the arctic and that must have consequences for our drinking water, we just don’t know exactly which.”

The páramos, as an ecosystem, communicates via clouds and precipitation with the lower located high Andean forest. In Colombia the páramos are protected for instance against agricultural and mining activities – but the high Andean forest is not. But manipulating the high forests with, for instance cultivating potatoes, also affects the páramos .

Maria Elena Gutierrez-Lagoueyte is, together with Daniel Ruíz Carrascal, a part of the Observatory for High Mountains, P o leka Kasue.

“We study the specific plants of the moorlands to be able to understand what happens when the temperatures are rising rapidly. Some plants can migrate up higher – but they can’t migrate as fast as animals. Other plants will die out because of the change and new plants will show up in the moorlands”. The researcher is trying to understand the resilience of these ecosystems; how fragile they are to the fast-changing climate.

“We don’t know what those temperature increasings will mean for the moorlands and in the end for our drinking water. OUR DRINKING WATER! That’s why it’s so important to study this,” Maria Elena Gutierrez-Lagoueyte explains.

The conditions for work and research are tough in the mountains.The researchers sleep in around 4 kilometers altitude. “It’s cold and hard for the body to stay here for longer time. Not everyone understands, but it’s difficult to work under those conditions,” says Maria Elena Gutierrez-Lagoueyte.

The same things are happening with the research in Colombia’s’ tropical glaciers, as with the general research about climate change: “The more we study the topic; [the more] we get to understand that those consequences are happening sooner that we first thought. At first, we thought that the glaciers would disappear in 2050. Then 2030. Now we believe some of them only have 2-5 years again – and some of the mountains already lost their glaciers. And this is happening right now”.

Maria Elena Gutierrez-Lagoueyte visits the national park every second month to check that the measure stations are working well, etc. To make sure that they are not losing important data. The team is measuring humidity in the soil every, then they installed two weather stations and 27 hob censors around the national park.

The páramos are unique ecosystems. And as they are well researched – everything is connected in the nature. If the tropical ecosystems get out of balance, it can get consequences for Europe as well. And then it’s about the so important resource and human right – water.

“We do those measurements to get a better idea of what the future will bring us. What the future will look like here in the páramos. To understand what’s happening with our drinking water too”.

Lise Josefsen Hermann is a Danish journalist based in Ecuador

Maria Elena Gutierrez-Lagoueyte

Páramos and Moorlands

The moorlands are very characteristic open habitats in temperate highland areas. They are low nutrient, waterlogged soils with acidic. What characterizes the moorlands are the comprise of; heath-land, with shrubs like bilberry and ling heather, which a kinds of bushes with, typically, lilac wildflowers; acid grassland, with long wavy hair grass; and swampy landscapes, with sedges like cotton grass, which look just like small cotton balls on a string, dotted across a large field of swamp, and much more. Various grazing animals manage the organic process of growth in the moorlands. The importance of the moorlands, not only for the flora and wildlife living in the areas, but for humans as well, is crucial. The moorlands function as natural water reservoirs for all the rain falling in the areas, which they release into the rivers and streams running down the altitude areas, to benefit those living in proximity to the water. Source: https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/what-is-a-moorland.html

The flowers and plants in the moorlands in Colombia are absolutely crucial for the Colombian population, as it is estimated that approximately 70 per cent of the Colombian population gets their water supply form the Chingaza National Park, housing a large area of moorlands. However, due to the increasing extraction of the Colombian natural resources, such as oil, coal and gold, the Colombian moorlands are experiencing degradation of its unique ecosystems. This degradation not only influences the health of the unique ecosystem, but pollutes the drinking water, damaging the health of humans, animals and the environment. The mining of the natural resources in the country has increased from 1 million hectares to 8.5 million hectares (which covers approximately 8 per cent of the land area) over just a 10-year-period. Source:https://www.oecd.org/countries/colombia/Colombia%20Highlights%20english%20web.pdf

One of the plants commonly connected to the Colombian moorlands, is the Frailejones– know as the espeletia in English. This unique plant is a member of the sunflower family, but looks more similar to small palm trees, with distinct stubby trunks, and leaves which look like daisies on top. It is said that, when the Andes Mountains rose for more than 2.5 million years ago, the Frailejones evolved, and have lived on the mountains ever since. The defences of the Frailejones have evolved since then, and the white leafs protect the plants form the sun rays, whereas fallen dead leaves keep the trunks warm during the cold nights. Source: https://www.colombia.co/en/colombia-country/environment/lost-world-colombias-ancient-plants/