MEET THE FIRST YAWANAWÁ RANGERS:

CRUZEIRO DO SUL, July 14, 2025 – Deep within a remote corner of the Western Amazon, little boys and young men dream of becoming heroes for their people. One of these, Kalebe Teixei da Silva, a member of the Yawanawá People, has longed to become a protector of the forest for as long as he can remember. 

Unfortunately for many, such a dream is out of reach as most Amazonian Indigenous territories do not have access to the resources needed to provide such trainings.

This year, however, WILD in partnership with the Yawanawá Socio Cultural Association, Chengeta Wildlife, and Langland Conservation, made Kalebe’s dream come true.

Matias Yawanawá, one of the patrol leaders, lines up in advance of the ranger induction ceremony held on July 14, 2025.

Over the course of two months in May and June of this year, 18 young people, men and women, received their first forest monitor training. With the help of two Chengeta Wildlife and Langland trainers, they enhanced their knowledge of how to survive in the forest and learned for the first time how to use satellite devices that will help them report both wildlife activity and illegal incursion into the territory. 

They also engaged in daily physical training in preparation for the grueling physical conditions they will face on their monthly, week-long patrols of the territory.

Yawanawá ranger trainees on their first training patrol in June 2025. These rangers will be solely responsible for the monitoring and reporting of their home territory.

Kalebe was among this first round of forest monitor trainees and excelled in all subjects. He and his peers developed a strong relationship with their trainer, a former instructor at the French Foreign Legion’s jungle training academy, and affectionately began to call him “the Professor.”

This was the first time such a training has ever been offered in the Yawanawá territory, marrying traditional Indigenous ecological knowledge with contemporary equipment and methods. In April of 2023, the Yawanawá Leadership Council, reeling from new threats to their territory brought on by Brazil’s former President Bolsonaro, asked WILD to help them develop professional paid patrols that could help them monitor and secure their territory.

This initial round of training is just the first step towards a more comprehensive solution that involves a couple of strategically placed monitoring stations, a secure data room, and a first aid outpost, as well as annual trainings. WILD is actively seeking funding to implement the entire Yawanawá forest monitoring? program. If you are interested in helping bring more security to the Amazon rainforest and the Yawanawá territory, please donate here.

The patrols will begin in August, occur over 1 week, and each forest monitor will earn minimum wage for their efforts paid by WILD. Perhaps just as important, is the new-found pride each forest monitor has knowing that he or she will be an integral part of the defense of the Amazonian forest and their community’s traditional lifeways.

Brazil’s Minister of Indigenous People’s, Sonia Guajajara, and Amy Lewis, WILD managing director, at the Mariri cultural ceremony in advance of the ranger induction ceremony.

The destruction of the Amazon accelerated under Bolsonaro prompting scientists to warn that Earth’s largest rainforest is now so degraded that it may be on the threshold of an ecological tipping point. If their predictions are accurate, this would result in a fundamental change in the ecological services that maintain the forest and lead to the irreversible loss of the forest.

Many believe that the frequent droughts that have plagued the Western Amazon over recent years are evidence that the entire forest, which stretches across 9 countries, could be on the cusp of a catastrophic collapse.

More than ever, the people who live in the forest and depend upon it for their survival must be equipped and empowered to defend it.

On July 14, at the end of the Yawanawá’s most important cultural celebration, Mariri, 18 young people stood before their community to celebrate their induction as the first Yawanawá rangers.

Rangers receiving their diplomas at the induction ceremony on July 14 during the Mariri cultural event.

Oblivious to the whoops and shouts of the onlooking crowd, Kalebe Teixei da Silva took his diploma from the Chengeta Wildlife trainer and put on the red and black bracelet cuff bestowed upon him by Chief Tashka, designating him as a warrior of his people. He had finally become a ranger.

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