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Guardians de l’Amazònia

The Associació Guardians de l’Amazònia is a non-profit organisation based in Catalonia which, since 2016, has been promoting international cooperation, education and social and environmental awareness initiatives together with participating communities, schools and organisations.

The association works for respect for the human and collective rights of Indigenous peoples, their languages, memory, territories, socio-biodiversity and traditional knowledge. It promotes cooperative relationships based on listening, reciprocity, participation and the recognition of communities as holders of rights and of knowledge.

Through the Escola Intercultural Amazònia (Amazonia Intercultural School) and its projects, we connect educational experiences in Catalonia, Brazil and the Amazon to promote intercultural education, climate justice, the ethical use of technology and care for life.

Assembly in a large community maloca (communal house)

At EiAmazonia, this mission takes shape in projects, exchanges, training and educational resources developed together with the participating communities and schools.

CONTACT

AREAS OF WORK

International cooperation and participation

Promoting international cooperation projects built with communities, schools, organisations and volunteers, encouraging intercultural exchange, participation and shared responsibility among everyone involved.

The initiatives cover education, culture, social issues and the environment, in line with the priorities and possibilities of those taking part.

Intercultural exchange between schools and educational networks

Fostering direct links between students and teachers at Indigenous schools in the Amazon and schools in Spain and other regions.

These exchanges encourage mutual learning, dialogue between different realities and an understanding of the relationship between territories, cultures, biodiversity and care for life.

Digital education, training and access to educational opportunities

Supporting digital literacy and inclusion, teacher training and the educational use of technology.

Encouraging the production of communities’ own educational materials and widening access to training opportunities, including public higher education, in line with the priorities and possibilities of each community.

Safe use of the internet, AI and digital rights

Promoting the mindful, safe, ethical and responsible use of the internet, artificial intelligence and other digital technologies in the territories where we work.

Encouraging training and community reflection on digital rights, privacy, health, risks and community autonomy.

Socio-biodiversity, languages and cultural heritage

Recognising and valuing socio-biodiversity, languages, memory, traditional knowledge, cultural heritage and the relationship of Indigenous peoples with their territories.

Promoting initiatives defined by the communities themselves to sustain their cultural, linguistic and educational processes, as well as the environmental protection and sustainability of their territories.

Collective rights and community strengthening

Promoting respect for the human, collective and territorial rights of Indigenous peoples, as well as for their autonomy, cultural identity and own forms of organisation.

Encouraging the participation of young people, women, teachers and community leaders in educational, cultural and territorial processes aimed at strengthening their communities.

Read about our mission and goals (in Spanish)

Honorary members

Txai Macedo, Puwe and Vari Puyanawa are not only people we admire: they are part of the personal story of those who started this project and of the very origin of the association. Our friendship with Puwe and Vari, born in the Puyanawa village, and the guidance of Txai Macedo — a friend and indigenist mentor to Adolf Sanz until his passing — made possible the first journeys, the Puyanawa people’s album, the story «Els Puyanawa i l’Eruga de colors – Hêda Cêkaya» and, later, the Amazon Guardian Schools Network.

Board of the Association

The Associació Guardians de l’Amazònia has 11 members. Three of them make up the board, which governs the association.

  • Adolf Sanz

    Adolf Sanz
    Founder and chair

  • Lidia Amaya

    Lidia Amaya
    Secretary

  • David Valenzuela

    David Valenzuela
    Founder and treasurer

Technical team, collaborators and partnerships

  • Puwe and Txuku Puyanawa with Sonia, from Guardians de l’Amazònia, and teachers from Escola Guillem de Claramunt
  • Puwe and Txuku Puyanawa with pupils in the playground of Escola Guillem de Claramunt
  • Talk by Puwe and Txuku Puyanawa with Adolf Sanz
  • Audience at a talk by the Puyanawa people
  • Txai Macedo sitting outdoors wearing a hat and a traditional armband
  • Large Amazon rainforest tree seen from below
  • Indigenous women holding placards for the climate and the Amazon at a COP30 demonstration
  • Presentation with Vari Puwe and Adolf Sanz at Casa América
  • «A resposta somos nós» (“We are the answer”) banner at a COP30 demonstration
  • Adolf Sanz taking photographs from a canoe on an Amazonian river
  • Three women from the team in an Amazonian community
  • Adolf Sanz with an Indigenous leader wearing a feather headdress
  • Queralt Solsona and Cristiane Puyanawa in the community
  • Online training session on artificial intelligence in teaching
  • Interview with Indigenous representatives on Ràdio Molins de Rei
People from the Puyanawa community dancing in a circle, holding on to one another

“The Network grows with you” campaign

We are looking for 50 regular supporters this school year

A monthly contribution, however small, lets us plan the school year without depending on a grant.

Join in

Be part of EiAmazonia

Supporters, volunteers, schools, Indigenous communities, professionals, institutions and companies can take part in the Network in different ways. Explore the ways to collaborate and find the one that best suits you or your organisation.

Choose how to take part

Txai Macedo

Honorary member
(in memoriam)

Antônio Luiz Batista de Macêdo, known as Txai Macedo (1952 – 2026), was born on the Transval rubber estate, on the banks of the Muru River in Acre, Brazil, next to a Huni Kuin community. He grew up witnessing the system of debt and forced labour imposed on rubber tappers and Indigenous people, and devoted his life to changing it. He was a rubber tapper, river pilot, mechanic, sertanista, indigenist, poet, singer and a spiritual reference in the Juruá valley.

A defender of the forest peoples. From the 1970s he worked with the anthropologist Terri Valle de Aquino and, with the Comissão Pró-Indígenas do Acre, travelled rivers, villages and rubber estates to explain their rights to communities and support the identification and demarcation of Indigenous lands. A friend and ally of Chico Mendes, he was a key figure in the Alliance of Forest Peoples, which united Indigenous and extractivist communities, and in the struggle that led in 1990 to the Alto Juruá Extractive Reserve, the first of its kind in the world. His research also helped defend the Ashaninka people of the Amônia River against logging, in a court case that ended in 2020 with a landmark compensation award.

A txai of the Puyanawa. He lived on Puyanawa land and raised a family there with Renilza Manaitá. Community elders remember his role in recovering memories, myths and spiritual practices. In 1989 he accompanied Milton Nascimento on the journey through Acre that gave its name to the album Txai, a word he explained as “a part of me in you and a part of you in me”.

His mark on Guardians de l’Amazònia. Until his death, Txai was a friend and indigenist mentor to Adolf Sanz, founder of the association. He stood by our association’s bond with the Puyanawa people from the very beginning and, above all, was one of the people who believed from the start in the Amazon Guardian Schools Network (REGA): in its great potential and in the deep need for an education that brings Indigenous schools together with schools elsewhere in the world. The story “Els Puyanawa i l’Eruga de colors – Hêda Cêkaya” also gives him special thanks. He died in Cruzeiro do Sul during the 2026 Carnival, aged 73, after a life devoted to the forest and its peoples, often in hard conditions. We remember him as the “singer of the forest” and as the friend and teacher whose memory continues to guide our work.

Puwe Puyanawa

Honorary member
Spiritual and cultural leader of the Puyanawa people

Puwe Puyanawa was born and raised in the Puyanawa village, in the Puyanawa Indigenous Territory (Mâncio Lima, Acre, Brazil), on the Moa River. A biologist by training and a musician, he is a spiritual, cultural and political leader of his people.

A life devoted to the Puyanawa rebirth. From 1911 his people suffered the invasion of the “rubber barons”: massacres, slavery on the rubber estates and a ban on their language, Ûdikuî, and their traditions. After their territory was demarcated in the 1990s, Puwe and his partner, Vari Puyanawa, led, from the mid-2000s, the revival of the language, ancient songs, symbols, body painting and spirituality of their people. In 2008 they opened a large maloca and cultural centre in the village, open to the other peoples of Acre.

His people’s voice in the world. Since 2013 he has travelled to Europe as an envoy of the Puyanawa, and in 2015 he took part in the UNESCO conference on Indigenous peoples and climate change in Paris, speaking out about the damage being done to the Amazon.

Key to the story of Guardians de l’Amazònia. His friendship and work with Adolf Sanz, founder of Guardians, lie at the origin of our association, founded in 2016 to defend and share the culture of Amazonian peoples. That same year the album of traditional Puyanawa songs was recorded with him in the village, the documentary “Sacred Land Puyanawa” began, and from 2017 his visits to Catalan schools gave rise to the Amazon Guardian Schools Network and the bond with Escola Ixubãy Rabuī Puyanawa.

Vari Puyanawa

Honorary member
Spiritual and cultural leader of the Puyanawa people

Vari Puyanawa is one of the leading cultural and spiritual figures of the Puyanawa people (Mâncio Lima, Acre, Brazil): an artist, singer and keeper of the knowledge of her people’s women. She holds a degree in Indigenous Education with a focus on languages and the arts from the Universidade Federal do Acre (UFAC) and is vice-president of Instituto Puwe. She is Puwe Puyanawa’s partner and a close friend of Adolf Sanz, founder of Guardians de l’Amazònia.

At the heart of the Puyanawa rebirth. Together with her partner, Puwe Puyanawa, she has led since the mid-2000s the revival of Puyanawa language, songs, body painting, graphic designs and spirituality, all banned during the so-called “time of captivity” on the rubber estates. With her daughters she is part of the family music group that keeps her people’s songs alive, and her role in organising the women has been vital for the community.

Key to the story of Guardians de l’Amazònia. Since our founding in 2016, Vari has shared with us the recording of the album of traditional songs, presentations in Catalonia and school visits, where she teaches traditional body painting and brings Puyanawa culture closer to children. Her story inspired the book “Els Puyanawa i l’Eruga de colors – Hêda Cêkaya” (2018), whose heroine bears her name and which is now read and performed in the schools of the Amazon Guardian Schools Network.