In Ecuador, in the protected reserve of the Otonga forest covering over two thousand hectares - an example of a green buffer zone in the heart of the Amazon - is situated the new Sendero Giuseppe Mazzotti. Extending for approximately two kilometres, it connects Otongachi with the Environmental Education Centre and its new visitors' centre. This is a site where international scholars who are studying the local flora and fauna can stay while carrying out their studies and discovering new animal and vegetal species, as well as ecotourists who wish to visit the reserve. The Otonga Foundation, coordinated by entomologist Giovanni Onore (who was one of the speakers at the conference “Let's start taking the environment seriously” organised by the Gambrinus Giuseppe Mazzotti Prize at Asiago in 2019), has decided to dedicate the path to Giuseppe Mazzotti from Treviso. The Associazione Premio Letterario Giuseppe Mazzotti believed in the project right from the start, in the secure knowledge that the motivations would have also excited its inspirator Mazzotti, truly an “ecologista ante litteram”. Onore mentioned the project he was planning during a conference dedicated to the Amazon, held at San Polo di Piave in 1992 (on the five hundredth anniversary of the discovery of America) and the Association immediately made a donation with which he was able to purchase the first 100 hectares of land. Over the years the Association has organised several fund raising events; in 1998 it involved its partner Valcucine and since then it has guaranteed continuous support for Otonga, through the Bioforest Association. The link between Fondazione Otonga and Premio Mazzotti is not just material support; they also share interests and ideals, inspired by Mazzotti himself. This acknowledgement would not only have made him proud, but testifies to his commitment to the environment and its protection, long before ecology was recognised as a science. Indefatigable and charismatic, in his circle of intellectual and artist friends Mazzotti counted brilliant, enlightened minds who had already formulated an ecological mindset and were personally opposed to consumption of the landscape, like the poet Andrea Zanzotto and traveller and writer Freya Stark.
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