Gavoitas can teach us a lot about how to deal with global warming. Located in Columbia’s Los Llanos region, it’s a village with about 150 residents. It was founded in the late sixties by Paolo Lugari together with friends from Bogota’s universities.
The land in Los Llanos is mainly savannah plans that get a lot of rain. Few people live there due to the poor soil quality. After flying over the area in 1965, Lugari wondered whether people could live there. He staked a claim to 25 000 hectares of land and Gavoitas – named after a local bird – was born.
The original settlers worked out a way to use the soil with cement to build houses and other infrastructure. Then they turned their attention to an efficient lightweight pump. It can be worked by children riding a see saw or a swing.
One of their greatest inventions was a windmill that works in the slightest breeze without the need for maintenance. But it took 58 attempts before the design was perfected. The windmills were then manufactured at Gaviotas and distributed throughout Columbia.
After that the settlers created a solar water heater. Amazingly, it still works in the rain. The heater delivered benefits far beyond Gaviotas. It was so effective and cheap that a factory was set up in Bogota to produce the device. Additionally, the factory gave jobs to street children dramatically raising their welfare.
Other amazing eco-friendly inventions followed these successes. A bio-gas generator, a solar pressure-cooker and a solar kettle were also successful. The solar kettle was a particularly important invention. It provides clean, safe drinking water.
As the poor soil made growing food difficult, the settlers found a solution. Containers made of nutrition less rice hulls were used to grow eggplants, lettuce, tomatoes and cucumbers. This was followed over the next few years with the creation of hydroponic greenhouses.
To cater for the villagers’ medical needs, they built a solar hospital. It’s cooled by the wind and heated by the sun. It was even named by a Japanese architecture journal as one of the world’s most important buildings.
The villagers even managed to find a plant that grows in the difficult conditions of Los Llanos – but with a twist. Caribbean pines from Venezuela will only grow in the Los Llanos soil if dipped in a fungus. The 20 000 hectares of pine forest planted by the villagers started to deliver many benefits quickly.
Seeds dropped by passing birds or blown in by the wind were able to grow due to the shade provided by the growing forest. As a result, the rainforest began to grow again, causing animal species like the armadillo, to come to the area.
The villagers were able to tap resin from the pines and process it into turpentine. This had the environmental advantage that it replaced the imported oil products that had previously been used. The turpentine factory was designed to be pollution-free and in 1997 was given a United Nations World Zero Emissions Award.
By planting the pine trees in ever-decreasing circles and tapping the resin, the villagers have restored fertile rainforest to an otherwise barren land. It’s an amazing achievement. But that’s not all. The villagers are working with the indigenous Guahibo people to research 250 new native plants species that have appeared and discover their ethno-botanical properties.
Gaviotas shows us what can be done to preserve the planet and how to live in harmony with the environment. Perhaps the last word about what could be done on a global scale should be left to Paolo Lugari:
“Just imagine. There are 250 million hectares of savannahs like these in South America alone. There’s Africa. The tropical Orient. Places where there’s space and sun and water. If we show the world how to plant them in sustainable forests, we can give people productive lives and maybe absorb enough carbon dioxide to stabilize global warming. This is a gift just as important down as our pumps and solar water purifiers. Everywhere else they’re tearing down rainforests. We’re showing how to put them back”.
