Recent Projects : WWOSH Group
Greenhouse Gas Emission Reduction Based on Social Recycling:
A Case Study with Waste Pickers Cooperatives in Brasília, Brazil
Julia Luz Camargos Mesquita; Jutta Gutberlet; Katiuscia Pereira de Araujo; Vanessa Resende Nogueira Cruvinel and Fabiano Harada Duarte.

The effect of greenhouse gases (GHG) is essential for life on land, but human activities have worsened this, causing environmental issues. In Brasília, Brazil, only 300 tons (12%) of urban waste are recycled by collectors, who work independently or in cooperatives. This research aims to understand the environmental and climate benefits of recyclable material collectors to reward their service. The study provides information to raise awareness in waste management, encouraging investment in reverse logistics, circular economy, and social and solidarity economy, prioritizing environmental protection through selective collection and recycling. The analysis shows that waste picker organizations significantly reduce GHG emissions and save energy.
The Case for a Climate Bonus:
Waste Picker's Perception of Climate Change in Minas Gerais, Brazil
Sonia Maria Dias; Vanesa Castán Broto; Juliana Gonçalves; Breno Cypriano and Ana Carolina Ogando
The article presents the importance of collectors for urban sustainability and how their work helps to reduce carbon emissions, for example, improving land use, preserving and expanding green areas, removing waste at source and facilitating energy systems innovative technologies, such as biogas. Not only that, the research provides a portrait of collectors’ experiences and perceptions about climate change and how environmental impacts affect their health and routine. Another point to comment on is the lack of government support and the urgent need to align federal, state and local efforts to provide waste pickers with a social safety net, appropriate technology and emergency support.

Stop treating waste pickers like garbage:
An autoethnography on informal waste picking in Brazil
Tara Rava Zolnikov.

The article explores the problems within the informal waste collection industry through an autoethnographic lens, using personal experiences for cultural insight. With 8 billion people generating waste and limited land for disposal, recycling emerges as the only profitable aspect, leading to informal waste collection by individuals or cooperatives. The qualitative research was conducted in Brasília, Brazil, at an old open-air landfill, once the world’s second largest. Work in the sorting center, which involves separating recyclable materials, highlighted issues like non-uniform waste collection and the associated dangers (physical, chemical, biological, ergonomic, social, and pathological) for street collectors. Despite improvements in sorting centers, conditions remain precarious with unmet wage rates, lack of labor rights, and no private health insurance, exacerbating collectors’ vulnerability. The article suggests solutions such as involving the private sector, NGOs, and government to formalize waste collection and improve collectors’ conditions. Autoethnography provides evidence of positive changes but also highlights urgent gaps needing attention.
Waste Picker Rights and Social Inclusion:
The Creation of a University with Knowledge Democracy
Jutta Gutberlet and Isabella de Carvalho Vallin
The article highlights the importance of creating a university that develops critical, social and democratic thinking for the social inclusion of collectors. In this sense, UNICATA is based on Paulo Freire’s popular education pedagogy for the construction of knowledge, in addition to bringing authors such as Piaget, Vygotsky, Kolb and Quijano, among others, as a theoretical basis for the preparation of the article, expanding the vision educational and social in a context of decolonization. The project brings a participatory research approach in which students work as researchers accompanied by academics to reflect and suggest solutions to problems such as social exclusion of waste collectors, limited opportunities available to collectors, in addition to the environmental and climate problems that make further development of waste management is urgently needed. Thus, investing in the education of waste collectors provides human development, greater preparation for job opportunities related to waste management and, ultimately, establishes waste collectors as citizens

Climate change education through drama and social learning:
Playful inquiry for building extreme weather events adaptation scenarios
Juliano Borba; Michelle Bonatti; Leonardo Medina; Katharina Lohr; Crystal Tremblay; Jutta Gutberlet and Stefan Sieber

The risks that humans and their enviroment take are increasing considerably due to climate change effects. Thinking about facing and preventing these situations requires criativity and technological innovations every day, and wtih that in mind, this article brings the result of a workshop made in Paraguay that aimed to explore these changes and catastrophes through playful activities using drama and the creation of texts and narratives. Focused on finding the best teaching method in the context of climate change education (CCE) under which, teachers can carry out CCE.