G20 Radio Bulletin 53 - G20 unites entrepreneurship and innovation on the Amazon River
Known for the preservation of the Forest and for uniting the Southern and Northern hemispheres, as it straddles the Equator, Macapá, the capital of the state of Amapá, is becoming the world capital of creativity and entrepreneurship for four days, as it hosts the international meeting of the StartUp 20 engagement group. Listen and find out more!
Reporter: Bringing together more than 400 entrepreneurs, StartUp 20 runs until February 26 and counts on representatives of the startup and technology ecosystem from 19 countries, including Canada, India, Japan, Oman, Portugal, South Africa, Spain, Türkiye and the United States. Discussions on macroeconomics and the potential economic development of the Amazon region, panels on innovation and entrepreneurship and technical visits to universities and research centers in Amapá are all part of the StartUp 20 program.
For the president of Abstartups and coordinator of StartUp 20, Ingrid Barth, the event is an opportunity to present the innovative and entrepreneurial potential of startups allied to projects committed to sustainability.
Ingrid Barth: We are fully capable of assuming this leading role in the world in relation to these issues. And the G20 is this great showcase and, in my opinion, technology is going to be the key for us to achieve these levels of development on these themes that we want. So it is really about bringing together everything that's happening: technology, innovation, sustainability, climate, energy transition, the Amazon, all in a single place.
Reporter: During the meeting, a fair is being held for entrepreneurs, mainly from the Amazon region, with technological solutions and the utilization of sustainable raw materials - moving products and services that integrate the bioeconomy. "Coffee" produced from açaí seeds, bio-jewelry made from raw materials such as seeds and natural fibers, biodiesel produced from tobacco plants, cheap and simple solutions for Covid-19 tests. Several innovative initiatives aligned with the necessity of preserving the environment, combating climate change, and reversing the global warming trend are being presented at the event. One of these initiatives is polymer mortar, made from sediments from the Amazon River and mining rejects, as Michael Tavares de Carvalho, from the Amapá company Mazodan, tells us.
Michael Tavares de Carvalho: Amapá is a long way from the big cities, so a lot of materials arrive here at prices that are a bit above the market and this ends up compromising and increasing the cost of construction. And so, taking advantage of all this research, we decided to create our own laboratory and run these projects of ours. And then we were able to analyze that we had a range of sustainable materials. We had mining waste that could be used to produce these materials and we also had sediment from the Amazon River.