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Pocket (Forests) Full of More Change
Five years of urban forest transformation in real time
Trees have a way of connecting people
I was standing in the crowd at Sustainable Brands Rio in 2016 — an annual convergence sparked by visionary Koann — surrounded by Brazil’s most innovative leaders. I had just said to a local colleague:
“These stories about business in the Amazon are interesting, but I would dearly love to hear more about forests in cities.”
Most people live in cities, and in Brazil that is the territory of the Atlantic Forest, not the Amazon, much as the rest of the world has its eyes on that (admittedly huge, important and beautiful) rainforest. And in my own home country of Canada, many of our urban spaces are built where forests once thrived, from Coastal Rainforests to the Boreal. I have a strong feeling deep in my belly that to get the future economy right, we need to heal our urban spaces.
“You need to meet Ricardo Cardim,” she said. “I can introduce you — he’s here.”
She led me to a youthful, dark-haired gentleman chatting with a small group, and proceeded to introduce me to this person who might just be the most important human the Atlantic Forest has ever known.
