Coimbra Sirica

Senior Vice President, Global

A former reporter who once covered crime, politics and HIV, Coimbra began freelancing for Burness in 1989. She joined the firm fulltime in March 2004. Before that, she had served four years as a science writer for the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), promoting new research in Science magazine and planning and implementing AAAS activities nationally and internationally. Coimbra has led on strategy and implementation of projects in Brazil, France, Italy, Norway, the Philippines, Spain, the United Kingdom and Vietnam. Coimbra speaks four languages (English, Spanish, French and Portuguese) and is conversant in Italian and Portuguese Creole. Before beginning her work as a science writer and communicator, Coimbra wrote for The San Francisco Chronicle, The Stamford Advocate and the Watsonville Register-Pajaronian.. A member of the National Association of Science Writers and the International Science Writers Association, Coimbra has volunteered as a program organizer for the annual meeting of the World Federation of Science Journalists. Coimbra was born in Portugal and raised in Brazil, Guinea Bissau, Senegal and Tunisia. She has served as a VISTA volunteer, teaching English to Vietnamese immigrants, and has a bachelor’s degree in languages and linguistics from Georgetown University.

Posts By Coimbra

Not For Sale: Indigenous Peoples Protect Their Lands—Sometimes with their Lives

There are few people who would refuse to sell their home—if the price were right. So investors might assume that money would mollify indigenous and other rural peoples whose land is wanted for gold mining, oil, timber or other extractive projects. But new findings released last month in London by the Rights and Resources Initiative and by TMP Systems revealed the opposite.

Indigenous Peoples ‘Paddle to Paris’ for COP21

Hundreds of indigenous peoples from the major tropical forest regions of Latin America, Africa and Indonesia traveled to Paris for COP21, hoping to be heard above the cacophony of voices shaping the long-awaited climate agreement.

Brazil’s Women Warriors Face New Challenge in Battle for Babassu Palm

Thirty years ago, the enemy was much easier to recognize and much easier to fight, says Dona Beliza Costa Souza, member of a union representing 350,000 rural women in northern and northeastern Brazil, who battle to protect the ubiquitous babassu palm trees that grow wild throughout the region.

All Posts by Coimbra

Why I'm at Burness

As a reporter who loved my profession, I dreaded going over to the “dark side.” Burness has allowed me to remain true to my ideals, while providing me the flexibility to be present in the lives of my family.

What Drives You?

I take joy in helping to disseminate evidence of problems that should be addressed and solutions that should be scaled up. And I've loved the work we've done to give people who have never been heard a voice on a global stage.

Daily Goal

To resist straying into my own self-centered vision of the world, and to be of service as best I can.

Hometown

By the time I was 15, I had lived in Lisbon, Rio de Janeiro, Recife, Dakar and Tunis. For the last 20 years, however, my hometown has been a village about an hour by car from New York City. My fellow villagers are my toughest audience; they are the hardest to reach with our stories, but the ones most likely to act if they are convinced that injustice must be righted.