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Tanama’s Story
The supershero Tanama is the creation of Haitian artist Thony Loui. The first comic book in the series was called Tanama: Origin, published in March, 2020, and the second is Tanama: Metamorphosis, published in June, 2022. It is a testament to the resilience of Haiti’s extraordinary artistic lifeforce that creativity of this kind can flourish even in these darkest of times for the nation.
At the end of Origin, Tanama awakens from a coma spent in a protective cocoon hidden deep in the forest. She has emerged because women farmers planted enough trees to empower the forest spirits to break the cocoon spell. In the new edition, Tanama starts out as Rachelle, a young woman in the process of discovering her superpowers.
Metamorphosis opens with a mythical Haiti in chaos as an alien lizard race tries to blend in with the population and build their evil empire. Rachelle’s aunt comes to the rescue by retrieving two ancient Taino artifacts made of cotton that, when combined, will release the power needed to fight a giant Komodo dragon that has been awakened by the alien lizards.
Tanama’s Mission
The mission of Tanama is to inspire children and youth, in Haiti and around the world, to:
Plant, protect and learn about TREES because they are a natural climate solution, and everyone need to be involved in supporting the new global movement for reforestation.
Support and understand the role of SMALLHOLDER FARMERS because 1/3 of the world’s population lives and works on smallholder farms, and with better support they can become a major force in planting trees to combat climate change and growing more food to feed us all.
Become agents for GENDER EQUALITY everywhere, but particularly for women smallholder farmers to have the same access to training and resources as men in order to be successful at planting trees and growing food.
Tanama’s Education Plan
The education plan for Tanama starts with the comic book series itself. It is first and foremost a series that is meant to entertain. But woven into every issue are themes addressing trees, smallholder farmers and gender equality.
Plans are now in development for Tanama to be the “presenter” in a series of companion booklets for use in Haiti school classrooms. These booklets, along with teacher guidelines and posters for classroom walls, will focus on environmental education, trees, smallholder farmers and gender equality.
In the library of each participating school will be copies of the comic book series to complement the classroom materials.
Tanama Supporters
Tanama’s Creator
Thony Loui
Tanama is the creation of Haitian comic book artist Thony Loui, who developed the story line to reflect the real-life experience of the Smallholder Farmers Alliance (SFA) and their members who plant trees and provide targeted support to women farmers.
