Chief Almir Narayamogo Surui, wearing a google shirt, at a Surui meeting in their traditional meeting hut, where they write up a declaration to defend their land against deforestation. The declaration is written up on his Apple computer
An Amazonian tribal chief Almir Narayamogo, leader of 1350 Surui Indians in Rondônia, near Cacaol, Brazil, with a $100,000 bounty on his head, is fighting for the survival of his people and their forest, and using the world’s modern hi-tech tools; computers, smartphones, Google Earth and digital forestry surveillance. So far their fight has been very effective, leading to a most promising and novel result. In 2013, Almir Narayamogo, led his people to be the first and unique indigenous tribe in the world to manage their own REDD+ carbon project and sell carbon credits to the industrial world. By marketing the CO2 capacity of 250 000 hectares of their virgin forest, the forty year old Surui, has ensured the preservation, as well as a future of his community.
In 2009, the four clans and 25 Surui villages voted in favour of a total moratorium on logging and the carbon credits project.
They still face deforestation problems, such as illegal logging, and gold mining which causes pollution of their river systems