For me the Caatinga is life just as water is life.
The dry season is a natural contrast that we can't avoid. We learned to deal with it and life goes on and gets better.
The Caatinga is like us, alive.
If we destroy it, we would be like killing someone - a crime.
When I was young, we had two names for caatinga passion fruit:
wild passion fruit and "ox" passion fruit.
Here it grows wild, we didn't plant it. It grew on its own.
We used to pick some, but most of it was wasted.
Wild caatinga passion fruit is the same as when it is planted - It just creeps up a tree or a cactus and grows.
It is different from when you plant or manage it.
Caatinga passion fruit and umbu plum used to go to waste, but after the work of the co-op that changed.
Children used to use it as a ball and now it's worth 40 Reais a bag.
The Caatinga passion fruit is economically viable and ecologically correct...
It is a native fruit that only uses water.
70% of the people in the co-op who use native fruit are women.
Women who process the fruit and make jellies, jams and pulps.
They market these products, increasing family income by 30%.
We started with a course about processing fruits around 1997
with a group of about 20 women, who then became multipliers, leaders in their communities.
30, 40 years ago many people used to move to São Paulo since there were no jobs here.
Today 90% of the youth still live in their community.
In our community the majority are youth who work with the processing of caatinga passion fruit, umbu plum and mango.
And at the co-op 20% of the workers are young people.
this improved quality of life, knowledge and education of families.
It is another lifestyle that at the same time shows the sustainability of the semi-arid region...
that here it is possible to live - to live well.