Big cities can no longer turn their backs on forests and must incorporate them into current urban planning. Present in ancient civilizations that inhabited the Amazon, for example, this is an idea rescued and defended by researchers and activists, such as the Italian writer Stefano Mancuso, an international reference in studies on plant intelligence. Mancuso was one of the participants in the 3rd edition of the Transmutar International Seminar, held by the Inhotim Institute, in Brumadinho (MG), last weekend. Related news: Deforestation in the Amazon falls 61.4% in May 2026. Government will appeal against changes to the Forest Code, says Capobianco. Solutions from the Global South are protagonists of Rio Nature & Climate Week. The writer and researcher presented the concept of phytopolis, which is inspired by the organization of plants to propose a radical transformation in the way cities are conceived. The proposal is to think of cities as urban organisms endowed with intelligence, resilience and adaptation capacity ─ a concrete strategy to combat the climate crisis and reduce the gap that has been created between humans and plants in recent centuries.⁠ Mancuso suggests that true urban evolution does not come from architectural solutions aimed at human well-being, but from a more fluid and organic interaction with nature, which recognizes humans as part of a broader ecosystem.⁠ "Plants are highly complex, sophisticated systems, but they are not superior to other living beings. Today, we consider plants a little more", said the Italian neurobiologist. Considering climate change and global warming, phytopolises can be part of the solution, as 70% of the world's population lives in cities. Reducing asphalt by 20% and replacing it with wooded areas would greatly help quality of life, argued the researcher. Mancuso adds that plants should also be inside buildings. Founder of the International Laboratory of Plant Neurobiology at the University of Florence, he estimates that an ideal phytopolis would have a vegetation cover of at least 60%. This city should also have a very efficient public transport network, as well as no combustion-powered vehicles.   The Italian writer and researcher Stefano Mancuso participates in the Transmutar International Seminar, held by the Inhotim Institute, in Brumadinho. Photo: Rovena Rosa/Agência Brasil The ecologist and curator of the Museum of Tomorrow, Fabio Scarano, highlighted that everything alive is intelligent, not just human beings. For him, Professor Mancuso's work has a political effect, because, by recognizing the intelligence of non-human beings, it may be possible to change our attitude and see them as brothers, as Saint Francis advocated. "They are not just landscape, they are not just resources for us to consume, 90% of the planet is made up of vegetation cover. It contributes to oxygen and food. Professor [Mancuso]'s work popularizes knowledge that is scientific and little discussed in schools", said Scarano. Amazon cities Archaeologist and anthropologist Eduardo Góes Neves presented manifestations of indigenous urbanism from 2,500 years ago in Acre. Then, between 1,500 years and 1,000 years ago, indigenous urbanization spread in several areas of the Amazon. "The main lesson of this old urbanism is that it doesn't put nature out. In São Paulo, we killed the rivers, they became garbage dumps. We excluded nature a lot", he criticizes. The professor at the University of São Paulo (USP) also pointed out that the most wooded neighborhoods are richer, while current urban planning turns its back on the most underserved populations.  "We have to think about the future with the idea of ​​garden cities. These ancient cities in the Amazon were garden cities. They were interspersed with forest areas. We have to bring the forest back”, said the professor.   Archaeologist and anthropologist Eduardo Góes participates in the Transmutar International Seminar, held by the Inhotim Institute during Inhotim Environment Week, in Brumadinho. Photo: Rovena Rosa/Agência Brasil Nego Bispo This year's theme of the seminar was Transfluences, inspired by the work of the quilombola thinker Antônio Bispo dos Santos, known as Nêgo Bispo, who died in 2023 at the age of 63. The program celebrated the 22nd Environment Week at Inhotim, the largest open-air museum of contemporary art in Latin America. The museum's director of Nature, Operations and Infrastructure, Alitah Mariah, explains that Nêgo Bispo has two concepts, confluence and transfluence. According to her, transfluence has everything to do with what the institute thought for the seminar, because it says that all human thought and action is circular ─ not only human but also that of non-humans. “For everything that goes, something stays, which is a little what we are trying to discover with these thinkers. What can we feed on, exchange and transform, and what remains of that”, said the director.   The director of Nature, Operations and Infrastructure at the Inhotim Institute, Alita Mariah, participates in the Transmutar International Seminar, held by the Inhotim Institute during Environment Week, in Brumadinho. Photo: Rovena Rosa/Agência Brasil Quilombola leader Joana Maria, daughter of Nêgo Bispo and resident of the Saco Cortume quilombo, in the interior of Piauí, explains that the concept of confluence comes from the meeting of rivers. Transfluence is movement and encounter, but overcoming barriers. “I found the theme of the event to be transfluence very interesting, because we live in a situation today where there are many barriers in caring for the environment, in relating to nature. Transfluence aims to make it possible to think about our ways of life, the way we take care of nature.”    Researcher Joana Maria, daughter of Nêgo Bispo, participates in the Transmutar International Seminar, with the theme Transfluences, held by the Inhotim Institute during Environment Week, in Brumadinho. Photo: Rovena Rosa/Agência Brasil   “We have to think of nature as a place of affection, a place of care, of relating. The river has to be clean so I can bathe in it and eat the fish”, said Joana. Technology and nature For Colombian cultural manager Ana Ochoa Acosta, founder of the culture and communication department at Parque Explora, in Medellín, Colombia, nature also includes what we produce with technology. “Returning to the archaic paradise is currently impossible. We are a combination of organic and inorganic worlds, of technologies that make us distinct. This is also nature. Wisdom is learning to live with this complexity from which we cannot escape”, said Ana. The biologist at the Emílio Goeldi Museum, in Pará, Sue Anne Costa, contributed with the concept of re-enchantment, to help gain another perspective in the decision-making process. “What the ancestral people had was this enchantment with the territory and the sacred. Most of the current decisions have productive, financial logic, of supposed development. This logic needs to change,” said the researcher.   The communications coordinator at the Emílio Goeldi Museum and professor at the Federal University of Pará, Sue Anne Costa Rovena Rosa/Agência Brasil Botanical Garden Recognized for its contemporary art collection, Inhotim is also a botanical garden that conserves more than 1,000 species of plants, regenerates native forests, protects wild fauna and maintains scientific research aimed at conserving Brazilian biodiversity. With 140 hectares of visitors, it is located in a transition area between the Atlantic Forest and Cerrado, two of the most diverse and threatened biomes in the country. The institution has already regenerated 75 hectares of native forest and maintains a stock of 34,215.13 tons of carbon, an amount that would require around 1.26 million urban trees to be stored.   Gardens of the Inhotim Institute, in Brumadinho (MG). Photo: Tomaz Silva/Agência Brasil *The report traveled at the invitation of the Inhotim Institute.