In order to guarantee income, it is necessary to be able to compete in the industrial market logic, even in precarious conditions. Investing in education is the only way to make a territory viable in the long term, even if there are no schools.

We start from three premises. First, it is essential that the intervention in a production chain happens simultaneously in all axes. Once again, this is a very concrete issue: there is no point in investing in management and productivity if there is no buyer market for a product. It is useless to connect the producer to new markets if he does not have the capacity to transform the product to add value. Point solutions and injection of capital into one-off initiatives often fail quickly.

This leads us to the second premise: investment should be continuous and long-term. Value chains take time to mature. The strengthening of the social fabric and the transformation of producers into protagonists takes time. And investment in education.

Our third premise is education. When we talk about education, we refer both to its formal aspect, with political-pedagogical projects suited to the territories, and to the transfer of knowledge that happens on a daily basis, when we sit with a fisherman on the edge of the pier, we learn about his dilemmas and challenges and we also talk about ours.

In 2021, despite the pandemic and with all the necessary care, the Instituto Interelos team was present in the territories where it operates, with dozens of trips by all its professionals. There were many coffees at the fishing dock, many conversations on boats and many online meetings (with poor internet). We work in territories as distinct as the Amazon and the outskirts of São Paulo – imaginary places for some people, but very concrete for us.

To learn more about our operating model and our trajectory promoting education and creating links between territories, markets, and investors, visit Who we are and What we do in the main menu.