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You may have heard of 'cupulate', a chocolate made from almonds of the cupuaçu tree, a fruit native to the Amazon.
In Belterra, a city in the interior of Pará, rural women workers are receiving training in a creative laboratory to produce and sell this type of liquor, using discarded almonds.
An institute that carries out actions in the Amazon is coordinating the activities and intends to install a biofactory in the region.

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- narration: Ismael Nobre
"The Creative Laboratory of the Amazon is a training structure for local communities, communities in the Amazon, in the interior of the Amazon, to learn how to make high added value products from what they normally collect in the forest or plant."

- narration: Selma Ferreira
"We always saw a lot of cupuaçu almonds lying around, which could be used. So we took them and made the first cupulete. That's how we found ourselves here."

- narration: César de Jesus
"The idea is to use them from the beginning of the chain, from the end of the chain, from the harvest, a technical approach to the cupuaçu production process."

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- Ismael Nobre - Executive Director of the Amazon 4.0 Institute
"The infrastructure we have here to provide this training includes energy, water and structures, both in the classroom, because this is a factory school, and in the manufacturing of the products themselves. So we have solar panels that generate all the energy we need, we have a water treatment plant, and also a sewage and effluent treatment plant. A classroom for 40 students, with tables, resources such as digital whiteboards, projectors, tablets and computers, because all production here is connected with digital resources, where all sectors, the chocolate manufacturing areas, are involved."

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- César de Jesus - instructor at the Creative Laboratory of the Amazon
"We have the Amabela version here in the Amazon 4.0 project, this edition. There are 27 students."

- Selma Ferreira - Coordinator of Amabela
"Amabela was founded in 2015. It is an intermunicipal association of rural women workers. It is from Belterra, Mojuí and Placas. We work with agroecology and defend the autonomy of women in our territory. We have 48 women."

- Ismael Nobre - Executive Director of the Amazon 4.0 Institute
"For this first phase of the Amazon Creative Laboratories project, we chose some communities that are representative of many other communities that work directly with the forest. They are traditional and native populations that manage the forest in a sustainable way. So we chose agrarian reform settlers, which is the case of this community."

- César de Jesus - instructor at the Creative Laboratory of the Amazon
"Here the focus is on cupuaçu, which is the most readily available material they have here. Harvesting, selecting the fruits, breaking them, fermenting them, drying them. Then we move on to the actual process, which is a bit of what we have here."

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- César de Jesus - instructor at the Creative Laboratory of the Amazon
"We really encourage their creation, their creativity, taking these materials and creating new, innovative products, in the sense of generating revenue, generating income."

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- Vera Lúcia Pereira Nunes - Creative Laboratory student
"Since 2018, we started working on reusing cupula and cupuaçu almonds. And when we found out about the project, we were very happy. And we knew that by using the almonds, we would have an additional financial resource. So, each family had to make use of them within the association."

- Valdivina Pereira Amaral - Creative Laboratory student
"What I found most important was our participation in the course. Then every afternoon, in the morning we arrive, in the afternoon we leave tired. But the next day we come back and we are ready to move forward."

- Selma Ferreira - Coordinator of Amabela and student of the Creative Laboratory
"The arrival of the laboratory has only added value to us. We now have a very cool innovation. We are with the community, with the youth, everyone here working. What we want is for our Amabela cupulate to be part of Brazil and the world today."

- Suelen Costa Feitoza - Creative Laboratory student
"Many people didn't believe in this project. For many, this would be impossible. And the only person who really convinced me to join this project was Dona Selma, because she was the only person who managed to prove it to many people. She is tireless, she is exploding, working, explaining, doing, proving the reality here in the settlement through the dome."

- César de Jesus - instructor at the Creative Laboratory of the Amazon
"There are a number of situations that are typical of communities, and here in particular, where there are only women. It's also a gender issue, a devaluation of these women who work here and the use of local materials that are often underutilized and sometimes people are practically at risk of food insecurity. However, there is a backyard full of products, of supplies that can be used. Our idea is to take these approaches. So here we make cupulate, we make chocolate, but we make chocolate with filling. They themselves have already started creating. One of them has a little cow there, she has already milked some, she has already made a sweet, and one of them has even created something very interesting that I didn't know about, she made a dulce de leche and added a little papaya, and added a little mint. It was slightly spicy, it was very interesting. And these things, letting their imaginations run wild based on some technical knowledge about cupulatoria and chocolate making."

- Suelen Costa Feitoza - Creative Laboratory student
"It's a good learning experience, not only in the theoretical part, but when it comes to the practical part, our reality often deviates a little from the theoretical, because we have to work with what we have, and we work a lot with reusing what nature provides us. So in chocolate we had this opportunity with cupulate to share and learn and develop some of our recipes. The inclusion of cupuaçu as a filling, not just as a cupulate."

- César de Jesus - instructor at the Creative Laboratory of the Amazon
"It's been a great exchange of experiences. I bring a little of what I've learned and my professional training along the way, and they bring knowledge of the territory and the ingredients that are available here. And this exchange generates new products, new approaches, even marketing ones. I can mention one quick thing: on that table over there, there are two types of brownie. A brownie that is a thick American cake. So one is made with cupulate and the other is made with chocolate. And it doesn't have wheat. What they have there is pumpkin flour. A lady who is a student here made a very reduced, hard pumpkin candy. I put it in the processor, it turned into flour and I brought it to the girls here. They didn't understand much, but I want you to let your imagination run wild and let's develop something with this product and with other ingredients that we have. The other day, a papaya candy with, for example, mint appeared. For me, it was something new; I'd never seen that before. A papaya candy without mint, just with coconut and a floured dulce de leche, as she calls it, to be used as a filling for the bonbon. Which is very interesting."

- Ismael Nobre - Executive Director of the Amazon 4.0 Institute
"We used to use cocoa and cupuaçu as the basis for this laboratory. But it is a creative laboratory in the Amazon. This creativity comes from the students' own creativity. So, the new member of the value chain here is the gerimum, or pumpkin, which they plant, and there is a lot of it. It was brought in as an ingredient to make flour, to make a gluten-free brownie, which turned out very good. With this new recipe brought by the Amabelas themselves, we can imagine this product reaching an audience that has gluten restrictions, for example, or a fitness audience, who is looking for an alternative diet. So, opening new markets for Amabela products and also further valuing local production, rural production, rural family production, which is also linked to a sustainable world of the forest."

- César de Jesus - instructor at the Creative Laboratory of the Amazon
The proposal of Amazonia 4.0 is a creative laboratory. I didn't come with proposals already set up in the market, but with proposals to innovate the product that is in the territory and with the people of the territory. And that's what we've been trying to do here."

- Selma Ferreira - Coordinator of Amabela and student at the Creative Laboratory
"From my family, within Amabela and the project, I have four children and three women, right! Who also help me a lot."

- Suelen Costa Feitoza - Creative Laboratory student
"In my case, I walk 19 kilometers. I leave home at 6:30 am to the factory, to where we are taking the course, the opportunity for the course. And I also leave at 6:30 am. I have four children and two stay at home, and two accompany me to the course."

- Vera Lúcia Pereira Nunes - Creative Laboratory student
"Our association is comprehensive, right? In the municipality of Belterra and also here in the Piamoju settlement. This adds value to all the women who participate in the association."

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- Ismael Nobre - Executive Director of the Amazon 4.0 Institute
"This training that we are doing now here with the women of Amabela is the second community. The first, the previous one, was in Surupuá, here in the region as well, within the Resex and Pajós Arapiuns, an extractive community. For this community, we have already obtained a donation of the biofactory, which will be installed there next year. And we are working so that, when this training here is finished, we will also have another biofactory coming here."

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- Selma Ferreira - Coordinator of Amabela and student of the Creative Laboratory
"I always like to talk, not only to my children, but to all the Nannies. Girls, think about the future of our children and grandchildren. So, may our cupulate factory come true, and may it come with great success."

- Suelen Costa Feitoza - student of the Creative Laboratory
"We are here with this work with the intention of, in the future, getting our own factory here."

- Valdivina Pereira Amaral - student of the Creative Laboratory
"It will be even better than now. In a while, right! Who knows."

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Source: Amazon Agency