In December 1988, Paulo Coelho participates in a 3-day debate cycle “Amazonia Iron and Fire – A Transdisciplinary Debate on the Global Crisis of the Great Forests”. The event is organised by The Universade Livre, joining the Amazon Day movement for the defence of the Amazon rainforest.

It is a transdisciplinary approach to the Great Forests Crisis, spanning multiple dimensions – social, economic, ecological, political, psychological, symbolic, spiritual, ethical, humanistic, planetary – of the ongoing and systematic program of devastation of the large forests currently underway throughout the world, from its origin and means of implementation to its immediate and future consequences, from the perspective of ecologists, artists, social thinkers, university teachers, independent researchers and citizens participating in the event, in the context of free and open debates.