It's a small world and it's getting smaller every day! CNN.com reported yesterday that the government of Brazil will provide free Internet access to native Indian tribes in the Amazon in an effort to help protect the world's biggest rain forest. You can read more about the Amazon tribes at the National Geographic site.
The environment and communications ministers signed an agreement Thursday with the Forest People's Network to provide an Internet signal by satellite to 150 communities, including many reachable only by riverboat, allowing them to report illegal logging and ranching, request help and coordinate efforts to preserve the forest.
The ministry said city and state governments must first install telecenters with computers in selected areas, including indigenous lands. The federal government then will provide the satellite connection.
There are currently a few telecenters on the outskirts of cities, but that the new ones will be built deep in the forest and will allow Indians easy access to public officials so that they can alert them of illegal miners, loggers and ranchers.
Indigenous leaders support the program but worry that computers might erode native cultures in a country that has well over 200 tribes, said Ailton Krenak, a member of the Krenak people and also of Brazil's national Forest People's Network. "I don't like computers but I don't like planes either," he said. "What can you do?"
What can you do? May I suggest that we leverage and use technology to advance the kindgom. The gospel knows no geographical or cultural barriers. It is good news for all mankind, including tribal Indians who live in remote villages in the Amazon.
My oh my, internet access for bush villages in the Amazon! Who would have ever guessed? It's a small world after all.
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