Brazil’s smallest indigenous autonomous community, members of São Paulo’s Jaraguá Guarani Indigenous community have founded a new village on land they claim is ancestrally theirs. The Guarani are seeking recognition from the Brazilian government for a total of 532 hectares (1,315 acres) of land in the São Paulo area that’s home to some 800 Indigenous people. The region is rich in mineral ores and consequently threatened by mining projects, real estate and a massive urban populous of São Paulo for decades now.
Leader of the movement, Sonia Guajajara says the “land was donated in 1987, giving the community property rights under civil law, not constitutional law, so the “retake” of Pindó Mirim is significant. “It strengthens their fight, because it strengthens the occupation of boundaries that had already been recognized by the Brazilian state,” she tells Mongabay.