The Juruna Indigenous community in the Brazilian Amazon calls 2016 the year of the “end of the world.” That’s when 16 tons of fish, their primary source of food, died as a result of massive water fluctuations caused by a dam on the Xingu River in the Amazon Basin. Owned by the Norte Energia company, the dam diverted water to Belo Monte, one of Brazil’s largest hydroelectric plants (together, hydroelectric plants produce almost 70 percent of the country’s power).
Fish die-off and other catastrophic effects of the dam might have gone unrecorded if it weren’t for a strategic collaboration that began a few years earlier, between the Juruna community and researchers at Brazilian universities. Together, they recorded changes in the abundance, habits, and size of the fish and turtles living in the river before the company began its operations on the dam.
With financial support from the Rainforest Journalism Fund in partnership with the Pulitzer Center, Brazilian journalist Sofia Moutinho spent 10 days traveling deep into the Amazon rainforest with scientists and members of the Juruna community to document their work and expose environmental damage caused by Norte Energia’s projects. Her story, “A River’s Pulse,” was published in English and Portuguese in Science magazine in January 2023.
Moutinho uncovered how Norte Energia had misled authorities in their environmental assessment reports by minimizing the impacts the dam would have on the environment. Data reported in the journal Science of the Total Environment revealed that the hydroelectric plant caused serious and potentially ongoing damage to fish populations. Yet the company’s reports citing that study concluded that no more damage than expected had been found.
Humberto Basilio spoke with Sofía Moutinho about her investigation, field reporting, and how to report on Indigenous groups respectfully. (This interview has been translated from Spanish and edited for length and clarity.)
How did you find and pitch this story?
I reported a different story about the Xingu River Basin in 2021. While I was there, I heard about how the Juruna were really invested in tracking the environmental impacts of the dam.
By chance, the following year, Dado Galdieri, a photographer who had worked with Science previously, reached out to an editor saying that the Juruna were promoting a canoe excursion to bring awareness to this situation. The photographer asked Science if they were interested, and my editor asked me if there was a story there. I said yes.
It’s difficult to get there and very expensive, so Science asked if I could reach out to the Pulitzer Center for a grant. I put a short pitch together and explained that this was a timely opportunity. My pitch focused on highlighting how Indigenous people’s knowledge can intertwine with scientific research. Photography was part of the story from the beginning, with Dado Galdieri listed as the photographer on the application.
In my pitch, I made sure to say that I had permission from the community, with an invitation from the Juruna chief. I also mentioned that I could write the story in Portuguese and English.
How did you prepare for this reporting trip?
I’ve been to the Amazon before, so I have a list of things that I know I have to bring. There was a lot of preparation because we were going to sleep by the riverside, so we needed to bring insect repellent, water-resistant bags, boots, light clothes, and a hammock, as well as the audio and video equipment.
I started reaching out to researchers, NGO representatives, and other independent sources before the trip. I like to talk in advance to know what I am supposed to look for in the field and who to talk with. These interviews are fundamental.
I also download studies and reports in advance to have them on my phone to consult during interviews. I write down a list with bullet points and dates in my notebook and download offline maps on Google Maps so I can carry them with me on the field, where I won’t have an internet signal.
How did you manage to put so much focus on Indigenous people rather than the scientists, seeing as the piece was for a science magazine?
The main characters in this story had to be the Indigenous people and not the researchers. That was a no-brainer. The whole effort came from the Juruna. They were the ones that looked for the partnership.
Still, it was challenging to focus on them because I was writing for a science publication and the editors expect you to report on results published in peer-reviewed journals. I was kind of lucky there was one study published in a peer-reviewed journal showing how the fish were affected by the dam. I think that opened the door for me to be able to publish a story like this in Science.
It was also challenging to show that the knowledge and the data that the Juruna have been collecting are as important as the data published in a peer-reviewed paper. I argued it’s science as well. It’s knowledge that they have been holding for centuries, gained by observing nature, but many times researchers don’t credit that information.
I constantly asked the Juruna people for data they had that was not necessarily published in papers. That’s where the map that we included in the story came from, which shows more than 30 fish breeding sites in flooded forests and islands recorded by the Juruna.
How did you notice the discrepancies between the Norte Energia report and the Science of the Total Environment paper they cited?
I was looking for published studies and scientific data measuring ecological impacts of the dam. When I saw the Science of the Total Environment paper, I reached out to one of the authors to ask if they had any interaction with the Indigenous people, if they knew about the independent monitoring they had been doing, and to know more about the study. The researcher replied that he had done the study as part of an environmental assessment with Norte Energia, but he didn’t respond to my follow-up emails asking for an interview.
When I read the paper more carefully, I saw a disclosure note saying the paper had funding from Norte Energia. That was very shocking to me.
The companies need to do these environmental assessment reports and they hire independent third-party researchers to do it. In this case, they hired researchers who are very well respected in academia to conduct the work. From what I could gather the scientists did it right. But when you look at the reports from the company you can see that the data is the same as in the scientific study, but the conclusion is different.
The scientific paper clearly states that the dam is causing a significant disruption in the fish population, decreasing the number of animals and the variety and abundance of species. It also predicts that these impacts will worsen over time.
But the company’s environmental monitoring reports, despite using the same data that the paper is based on, are less direct in describing the impact. They use vague language, they use the data that was more convenient for them, and they don’t suggest that the dam’s negative impact will increase. These reports focus on showing the nice things the company is doing, like keeping an alternative channel for the fish to transit up and down the dam.
Did you feel a need to write a story that pleased the Juruna Indigenous community?
I feel very pressured all the time. I felt it during this story and I always do. When the story gets published, I’m afraid it won’t meet the expectations of people who trusted me. So it’s a constant internal battle of me trying to remember my place as a journalist.
I take a few approaches when I’m reporting on Indigenous communities. First of all, I present myself very clearly from the get-go and tell them what the work of a journalist is. Sometimes we take for granted that everyone knows how we operate, but that’s not true, especially in remote areas. So I explain what I’m doing and why I’m there. I also highlight that telling their story in an international media outlet may give them exposure to different people around the world.
I always make efforts to stay in touch with them because this community has been exploited by people like missionaries, explorers, and anthropologists that just go there, take what they want, and never get back to them. I’m very careful not to do that as a journalist. I’m still in touch with people from the community to this day. I care about them because we established a human relationship. I recently messaged Josiel, the main character in the story, asking how the community is doing. I keep my channels open for them to reach out to me if they need anything or want to share any other story. After the story’s publication, I sent them the Portuguese version and the pictures of them I took during the reporting.
How do you manage your anxiety around meeting the community’s and your editor’s expectations?
The first time I went on a trip like this, I kept a personal diary for my thoughts and feelings. So I had two notebooks—my diary and one for taking reporting notes.
Nowadays, I mix personal and field notes. I write everything in this journal. These can be very personal things, from being anxious about my responsibility towards my sources as a reporter to interactions I had with people in a more relaxed moment, to my feelings and sensations. I think writing down these things helps me to unload my anxiety, and it also has a practical use later when I am writing the story.
Did your preconceptions change in the course of reporting and writing this story?
In the beginning, my idea was to focus on the challenges of bridging scientific knowledge and methodologies with the traditional, ancestral, and observation-based knowledge of Indigenous people. But during my reporting, I decided that the story should instead focus on this specific collaboration between groups. By talking with the researchers involved, I understood that they were more interested in helping the Juruna than in advancing their scientific careers or publishing in high-impact journals. For the Juruna, their goal was more practical as well—they needed the researchers to help them build and implement environmental monitoring methods based on valid science. In this way, the Juruna could politically use this evidence to fight for their rights and for better living situations. So my initial idea, which was more conceptual, kind of vanished.
What was your collaboration like with the photographer who accompanied you on the trip?
The needs of a photographer are very different from the needs of someone who focuses on text. I am thinking about the narrative and trying to get good stories and quotes from people, and he is focused on the image. So it was interesting to find ways to combine our reporting in a way that both of us would have what we wanted without being too much of a burden on the people we were talking to. During the mornings before going out to the field, we would talk about the interviews I needed to get and the images he wanted to get. This way we could make a strategic plan to make the most of the limited time we had. In this way, we would adapt to each other’s needs.
Dado was a great photographer and he was also helpful with the reporting part. From the beginning he was struck by the change in the pulse of the river, which ended up being the headline of the story. He wanted his pictures to show how this community was so intertwined with the water, how the pulse of the river changed, and how that changed their lives.
Humberto Basilio is a Mexican freelance science writer and a TON early-career fellow sponsored by the Burroughs Wellcome Fund. He has written for Eos, SciDev.Net, World Wildlife Magazine, and other publications. He is a member of the Mexican Network of Science Journalists and the Oxford Climate Journalism Network. Follow him on Twitter @HumbertoBasilio.
