About 8 years ago I have invested money in Brasil, in teak plantations. This organisation (Floresteca) controls the largest privately owned tree plantations in the world, in total 60000 ha of land of which 21000 ha is planted with teak trees. (goal is 100000 ha in 10 years).
This organisation works along the principle of PPP, it must be good for the People (so: labor, education. development), Planet (so: sustainable, improving environment) and Profit (so: earning money).
Now that I am in the 'neighbourhood' it is a good opportunity to see what Floresteca is doing. There was the possibility to travel around for a week with a group of other dutch investors.
In the 'neighbourhood' means, although the plantations are situated just across the Bolivian border, that I had to fly from La Paz, via Lima and Sao Paulo to Cuiaba, so about two times east west across this continent, about the same distance as from Europe to here.
On sunday I arrived. We had a week full of activities.
We visited plantations, the nursery, the sawmill, the carpenters workshop, the natural forests, the laboratory and the school that is adopted (together with Unesco).
In between the teak oriented visits we had a horseride through the savanna jungle, we sailed with speed boats down the Rio Paraguay (100 km, 60 km/h), to a lodge from which we looked for all kinds of animals (also by boat).
In the lodges we could swim in nice swimming pools to cool down. It can be hot here. Sometimes we touched 38 degrees, and with this humidity it is heavy. We had also rainshowers: the tropics in the rain season.
In the lodge along the Rio Paraguay there was a Brazilian singer (he was hired for us), that was great. I like this kind of music very much ('saudados, corazon, sentimentalismo y romanticismo'). In this vicinity, at the riverside, under the stars, with this temperature it gets a special meaning.
On saterday I will travel to Bolivia. This will go much slower: the region is huge and roads are in a bad shape.
