Azimuth World Foundation

08/31/2026

08/09/2026

Today, on the International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples, we're sharing a testimony from Friday Laban, one of the students supported by Indigenous Batwa Bido's education program in Uganda.

As BIDO's partner, we've seen time and again the determination of the Batwa community in Kashija village to overcome decades of marginalization, working toward food security and access to education for Batwa youth.

Friday speaks with real pride about being a Mutwa, and shares his hope to one day help other Batwa children get the same chance at school that he did. It's a beautiful thing to witness.

He's currently in technical school training to become a car mechanic, and continues to be supported by BIDO's education program.

08/04/2026

Last week in Kéké 2, Mauritania, women received traditional milk collection tools through an activity organized by ASCOM, an organization Azimuth recently began supporting.

ASCOM's team told us the calabash is the preferred container for collecting cow's milk, a staple in Fulani culture. It preserves the milk in its natural state, unlike plastic buckets, which are the most widely used today but have negative effects on fermentation and temperature regulation.

The tools also allow the women to collect the largest amount of milk during the rainy season, when the herds return to the villages in search of pasture. Some of the milk is consumed on the spot by families. The surplus is for sale, either as raw milk, which keeps no longer than 24 hours, or as curdled milk, which lasts longer, depending on what the customer prefers. These tools allow for preservation while maintaining the milk's quality over a long period.

In Fulani culture, the calabash is associated with women and the home, with its round shape evoking motherhood and fertility.

Learn more about our partnership with ASCOM: https://azimuthworldfoundation.org/partnerships/grassroots-organizations/ascom/

08/03/2026

In Kashija village, in Kisoro, Uganda, the Batwa community is preparing the ground together.

Food sovereignty is slow work. It asks a community to learn techniques that take seasons to show results, to keep going when a first attempt does not hold. For the Batwa community, it means you have to believe in transformation and in the possibility of overcoming entrenched marginalization.

For the second year of Seeds of Sovereignty, Indigenous Batwa Bido thought deeply about what worked last year, and what could be improved, taking the time to build this project layer by layer.

Composting was not easy to implement last year, but now a compost house stands in the village, protecting the manure from the rain. Kitchen gardens have been marked out and fenced. Nursery beds are in the ground, and the community has received new utensils and seeds to continue what they began last year. Underneath all of it is something that cannot be lost: the belief that members of the Batwa community can feed themselves.

Azimuth World Foundation is supporting Seeds of Sovereignty for a second year, alongside BIDO’s education programme in Kashija.

Photos courtesy of BIDO.

07/21/2026

Cebaldo Inawinapi was born in Usdup, an island in the Guna Yala archipelago in Panama. When he was born, his father planted the placenta and the umbilical cord in the jungle across from the island. From this ritual, a tree sprouted.

In 1979, Cebaldo left for the Soviet Union, where he studied archaeology. It was there that he met a Portuguese woman who would later become his wife. In 1987, they moved to Portugal. Today he is an anthropologist, writer, poet, and researcher at the University of Trás-os-Montes and Alto Douro.

He wrote “Mi primer árbol”, a bilingual book in Guna and Spanish about that initial ritual: when a Guna child is born, the umbilical cord is planted, along with a tree. He acted in the film “Panquiaco”, in which he portrays his own conflicts around belonging and return. He curated an exhibition at Casa da América Latina on “molas”, the textiles made by Guna women that tell stories, prophecies, and dreams.

We spoke with Cebaldo at FÓLIO - Festival Literário Internacional de Óbidos, in Portugal.
WATCH, LISTEN or READ the full interview (Available in English and Portuguese): https://azimuthworldfoundation.org/stories/cebaldo