Petrobras Magazine

Committed to a sense of social responsibility and to provide incentives to Brazilian culture, Petrobras, together with the companies Vale, Banco Real, and Natura, have, since 2006, sponsored socio-cultural workshops of the non-governmental AfroReggae Cultural Group in the Vigário Geral, Cantagalo, Parada de Lucas, Complexo do Alemão, and Nova Era slums in Rio de Janeiro. With the same partners, the company also sponsors the TV program of the group, Conexões Urbanas (Urban Connections), which is broadcast on the Multishow channel. In partnership with the Banco Nacional do Desenvolvimento Economico e Social, the company is financing the construction of the Waly Salomão Cultural Center, which will be inaugurated in March 2009 in Vigário Geral. In addition, bands of the Group are contracted to appear in events overseas. In this way, investment is made in the potential of the Rio de Janeiro slum children and adolescents, bringing to them education, culture and art, teaching them a profession, and preventing them from becoming idle and likely to be recruited by drug dealers, or having to survive with some menial job.

“We guarantee a cultural and artistic grounding for those who live in risk situations so that they no longer figure as statistics of poverty and violence in Brazil, becoming citizens contributing to the generation of wealth and receiving a just share of it, and, at the same time, becoming a multiplying factor of the knowledge they have gained. We believe this is the first step in bridging the abyss existing between whites and blacks, rich and poor, and in combating urban violence and promoting the effective development of Brazil,” sums up the executive coordinator and artistic director of the group, José Junior, who was also one of the founders.

Today, Petrobras sponsors workshops for percussion, dance, theater, and shiatsu in Vigário Geral; two circus troupes on the Cantagalo hill; informatics technology courses in Parada de Lucas; dance, circus, theater, and percussion workshops in the Complexo do Alemão, and workshops for theater, percussion, and circus in the Nova Era community. To have some idea of the participation involved, 9,400 young people took part in the workshops in all the slums from January to October 2008 alone, and since their creation the workshops have provided professional training for additional thousands of adolescents. The Parada de Lucas nucleus, in turn, has also borne fruit. The location includes a radio website, the afroreggaedigital.com, which broadcasts news items, musical programs, and coverage of events, in addition to functioning as a radio and multimedia school. Another project is under study there, the structuring of a Communications agency, which will facilitate the dissemination of information about the NGO’s various projects.

Petrobras also sponsors the weekly TV program, Conexões Urbanas (Urban Connections), which airs on Mondays at 9:45 pm, on the Multishow channel. The objective of the program, another of the group’s successful projects, is to present social initiatives undertaken by the government, private enterprises, and NGOs which contribute to ending discrimination related to minorities and all types of social apartheid, providing not only the repudiation of the reality but principally the positive action taken to correct it. “This is not just another TV program but a televised social movement,” explains José Junior.

For performances in events sponsored by Petrobras abroad or events in which it participates, the company contracts bands from the AfroReggae Cultural Group, such as the AfroReggae Band and others which originated from the group, including Afro Lata, Afro Samba, Afro Mangue, Makala Music and Dance Band, Tribo Negra, Akoni, and Kitôto. Last year, for example, the company hired the Afro Lata Band to perform at the livestock and industrial exposition, Expoprado 2008, in which it took part in Uruguay. Also in 2008, it was the Makala Music and Dance Band’s turn to perform at the 5th Annual International Artivist Film Festival and Awards, a festival of documentary films, sponsored by the company, which aims, in annual events, to bring awareness to people worldwide regarding questions related to environmental protection, human rights, and child and animal protection. The theme of the festival was “A person with a camera can make all the difference in the world,” and that idea is totally identified with the bands of the AfroReggae Cultural Group, which, through their music, have made a difference in the lives of many adolescents and in Brazil.

“Music has been a fundamental instrument in attracting young people to participate in our workshops and other activities, a weapon against poverty and violence. And the success attained by the AfroReggae Band, both in the artistic and social environment, has stimulated many young people to follow the same path. As a result, our other musical groups appeared,” says José Junior.

Another ambitious project which will become a reality, again thanks to the Petrobras/ BNDES partnership, is the Waly Salomão Cultural Center, which promises to become a point of reference in its area of operation. As such, it will be inaugurated in grand style with the presence of authorities and artists. “The center, housed on four floors, will function 24 hours a day and is being prepared to be a cultural center of excellence in Rio de Janeiro. Without doubt, it will be the biggest center yet constructed in a Latin American ‘slum. It will have a video room, a library, a multimedia auditorium, rooms equipped for Internet access, a music studio, a stage, a dance room, sports courts, rooms for social and psychological attendance, and classrooms where the workshops will be held,” explains José Junior. The anthropologist Hermano Vianna is in charge of the layout and organization of the center, together with the AfroReggae Cultural Group.

The group’s work has broadened the horizons of many people and has managed to integrate communities even when they are located in areas where drug trafficking factions are at war, which has made it the subject of prize-winning documentaries abroad. An example is Favela Rising, which received the award as the best documentary in the world from the International Documentary Association in 2005, as well as 35 other international awards. “Parada de Lucas, is the neighboring slum to Vigário Geral, and has been its enemy since 1985 because of drug dealer rivalry. Despite the conflict, we took our work to Parada de Lucas because the war we are engaged in is in favor of citizenship,” says José Junior, who, together with the other members of AfroReggae, created a production company to provide commercial support for the bands created by the NGO.

Aware of the importance of the AfroReggae Cultural Group’s work, Petrobras is making its contribution to the continuation of the group’s activities. “AfroRaggae does much more than discover talented young people. It develops in them a sense of belonging to a group and self esteem, thereby facilitating their entry into the labor market and expanding their horizons. In other words, the goal is to produce conscientious citizens who make a difference in the nation and help construct a better world for future generations. We can only applaud and encourage initiatives like these,” says Eliane Costa, the Petrobras manager of Cultural Sponsorship.