The healing power of nature is scientifically proven.

Trees, plants and flowers work on a person’s body, remove impurities, improve immune functioning, reduce the stress, help better pain control management and improve physical and emotional well being.

Healing gardens have been received enthusiastically by researchers and practicing health professionals for the use of patients, staff and visitors in hospitals, nursing homes and hospices.

Such gardens play a therapeutic role and provide health benefits to specific needs for different patient populations. Individuals who are exposed to a healing garden enjoy the restorative power of nature and thus feel better.

There are many advantages to a hospital investing in a garden, which in relation to the total cost of building and equipping a new facility represents a very small amount. A healing garden is both a process and a place. It is a concept at the meeting point of medicine and design.

Some of the problems involved in the provision and retention of such gardens stem from the fact that the medical profession thinks in terms of the internal process of healing but barely recognises the potential impact of the physical environment; while designers are familiar with manipulating the elements of place, but sometimes overlook how these impact mood and behaviour. Clearly, continuing dialog and joint research between these professionals is called for.

According to Clare Cooper Marcus, healing is not synonymous with cure, but a healing garden can have many properties described as therapeutic, restorative and rehabilitative:

* Facilitate stress reduction which helps the body reach a more balanced state

* Help a patient summon up their own inner healing resources

* Help a patient come to terms with an incurable medical condition

* Provide a setting where staff can conduct physical therapy, horticultural therapy, etc.with patients

* Provide staff with a needed retreat from the stress of work

* Provide a relaxed setting for patient-visitor interaction away from the hospitalinterior.

Paper Healing Gardens in Hospitals, Clare Cooper Marcus, 2005

For more information you can consult a Therapeutic Landscapes Database.

Dia dos Namorados – “Day of the Enamoured” – is firmly established as a special date in Brazil.

It is celebrated on June 12, the day before the day of Saint Anthony - the patron saint of marriage.

The Brazilian Day of the Enamoured in June 2008 boosted sales of heart-shaped chocolate boxes, perfumes, cards, red roses and cosmetics.

As every year, couples expressed their love for each other by exchanging gifts and spending romantic time together.

In 1972 was established the World Environment Day by the United Nations General Assembly.

The main celebrations of World Environment Day 2008 are held in New Zealand. The slogan is: Kick the Habit! Towards a Low Carbon Economy.

The World Environment Day 2006 was held in Algeria and the theme was Deserts and Desertification.

In Brazil, the north-eastern portion is the driest and poorest part of the country. It is a semi-arid region which is periodically devastated by severe droughts.

Considering the desertification problem, which leads to massive migration and poverty, ways of stopping deserts from spreading are discussed in the context of the PAN-Brazil, a National Program to Combat Desertification, following the guidelines of the UN Convention to combat desertification (UNCCD).

In 2006, the United Nation Environment Programme (UNEP) introduced key facts about deserts and desertification, as follows:

The consequences of desertification include:

• diminished food production, reduced soil productivity and a decrease in the land’s natural resilience;

• increased downstream flooding, reduced water quality, sedimentation in rivers and lakes, and the siltation of reservoirs and navigation channels;

• aggravated health problems due to wind-blown dust, including eye infections, respiratory illnesses, allergies, and mental stress;

• loss of livelihoods forcing affected people to migrate. Drylands remain impoverished because:

• poor people living in drylands, especially women, seldom have a strong political voice and often lack essential services, such as health care, agricultural extension and education; women are also regularly discriminated against under land ownership regulations;

• dryland dwellers often lack agricultural necessities, such as tools, fertilizers, water, pesticides and seeds, they have inadequate access to markets and their products seldom fetch reasonable prices due to low quality;

• local communities often fail to benefit from other local resources, such as mined minerals, or wildlife and other tourist attractions;

• access to water and rights over this resource are often inadequate, and water resources are often poorly managed, leading to overuse and salinization;

• land is often overcultivated and overgrazed, leading to declining productivity;

• dryland communities are especially vulnerable to drought; they often depend on livestock or subsistence crops and lack reserves of food, money, insurance or other forms of social safety nets to cope with difficult years.

Fighting poverty in drylands requires that all these problems are addressed simultaneously.

The UN Millennium Ecosystem Assessment notes that it is easier to prevent desertification than to reverse it.

Population pressure and bad land management practices are the cause of degradation.

Better management of crops, more careful irrigation and strategies to provide non-farming jobs for people living in drylands could help to address the problem.

So on this World Environment Day, let us reflect on the desertification consequences, with focus on the importance of preventing it instead of reversing its process. Let us preserve life in north-east Brazil with help of the experiences of Algeria and other desert countries.

Every year, the African Union (AU), formed in 2002 from the Organisation for African Unity (OAU), celebrates Africa Day.

This year, people in Brazil joined in the celebrations all over the country on 25th May.

The streets were full of people singing to celebrate the contribution African people make to our country.

Nevertheless, we cannot forget that some of the social difficulties experienced by Afro­-Brazilians today are: low level of education, low wages and material poverty.

Unfortunately, the fact that most of the Afro-Brazilians have not the opportunity of attending school or learning a profession, according to the Brazilian Institute for Statistics and Geography – IBGE, is certainly a result of past (when nothing had been done to integrate their former ancestors, the African slaves) and of the straitened circumstances of the country.

We hope this situation will change in the near future. Let us be determined to contribute through our work to fraternity and peace world-wide.