The Founder

Credentials & Experience

• Degrees in Pedagogy and Pedagogy in Physical Sciences
• Founder and sole director of Juliana’s Animal Sanctuary (23 years): the only GFAS-verified sanctuary in South America, home to 180+ rescued animals, registered U.S. 501(c)(3). In 2021, recognized by GFAS as Outstanding International Animal Sanctuary: the highest distinction awarded by the Global Federation of Animal Sanctuaries
• International Programs Coordinator at Food Yoga (formerly Food for Life Global, ffl.org): one of the world’s largest plant-based food relief networks, operating in 60+ countries
• Worked hands-on with 12+ schools across Colombia: both public and private: implementing plant-based and animal respect education with documented results. Direct experience confirms: children are the most powerful agents of family change. When a child shifts their perspective on animals and food, the whole family feels it
• Recognized nationally by the Colombian government as an animal welfare protector: Gold Medal distinction
• Recipient of the Lisa Shapiro Award by Our Hen House (2015), recognizing unsung heroes of the vegan movement
• Elected member of COMUPAZDH: Consejo Municipal de Paz, Reconciliación, Convivencia, Derechos Humanos y Derecho Internacional Humanitario del Municipio de Chía. The Colombian government formally recognizes veganism and plant-based living as tools for peace, reconciliation, and human rights
• Co-leads Food Yoga’s global headquarters alongside her husband, giving her direct insight into food insecurity, dietary patterns, and cultural barriers across dozens of countries in the Global South
• Creator of the Maha educational project in 2009: Maha means greatness in Sanskrit, reflecting the belief that what begins as a small local program becomes truly great through the people who carry it forward
• Mother of a 10-year-old child raised plant-based from birth: a living proof of concept that inspires parents and children across her network

Project Origins

This initiative was born in 2009 under the name Maha: a Sanskrit word meaning greatness: reflecting a foundational belief: that what looks like a small local program can be made truly great by the people who carry it forward. Sixteen years later, that belief has been validated by experience. The model works. Now it is time to scale it.

The strategy is deliberate and precise: attack the root. Not the countries that consume the most meat: but the countries that produce and export it. Colombia, Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, India. These are the nations feeding the global appetite for animal products. Change the values of the next generation here, and you change the food system at its source. That is what Maha was designed to do from the very beginning.

Collaborators

Juan Faundez: Vegan filmmaker and visual content creator with extensive experience producing short films and printed materials promoting veganism and plant-based living. Juan has collaborated with Juliana on multiple projects and will lead the visual and multimedia content development for Maha.

Paola Velasco: Co-founder and Director of Operations. Industrial designer and project coordinator with direct experience inside both founding organizations. She has served as project coordinator and personnel coordinator at Juliana’s Animal Sanctuary, and as project coordinator for Food Yoga International for two years. She knows the operational reality of Maha from the inside, and brings the design and systems thinking needed to turn a proven field model into a scalable, replicable program.

The Problem We Are Solving

The Geographic Blind Spot

Colombia, Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, and India are among the world’s largest exporters of beef, dairy, and live animals. They are also among the countries with the least systematic plant-based education infrastructure. This is not a coincidence: it is a gap that the global movement has systematically ignored.

Changing food culture at the source: in the countries that produce and normalize meat consumption for the entire planet: has a multiplier effect that no European program can match. One child in Brazil who grows up understanding the relationship between animals, food, and health does not just make one personal choice. She shapes the food system of the future in a country that exports that food system to the world.

Why Laws Are Not the Answer Here

In highly developed countries, legislation can be a powerful lever: and it has been. But in Colombia and most of the Global South, the sociopolitical reality is fundamentally different. Governments are navigating extreme poverty, food insecurity, corruption, and institutional fragility. Expecting these governments to pass plant-based dietary reform or strong animal protection legislation: and then enforce it: is not a strategy. It is a fantasy.

The strategy that actually works here is education. Not because it is the easy path: it is not. It is the path that builds something governments cannot take away: the freedom to choose, informed by understanding. Education creates independent, lasting change from the inside out. It does not depend on a political majority, a sympathetic minister, or enforcement capacity that does not exist.

Why Children and Young People

Children are the highest-leverage audience for lasting cultural change. They form habits and values that persist for life. They bring what they learn home, and they influence their families’ choices. They grow up to be parents, teachers, chefs, farmers, and policymakers. And in the Global South, where families are large and multigenerational, the ripple effect of one child’s shifted perspective extends far further than in a Northern European household.

In countries like Colombia, school is also one of the few institutions that reaches across socioeconomic divides. Public schools serve the communities that need this education most: and that currently receive it least. And crucially, what Juliana has witnessed firsthand across 16 years and 12+ schools confirms something the research also shows: children do not keep what they learn to themselves. When a child shifts their understanding of animals and food, they go home and ask questions. They challenge family habits. They request different meals. They share what they saw at the sanctuary. The family changes because the child changed first. In the Global South, where families are large, multigenerational, and deeply food-centered, this ripple effect is not marginal: it is the strategy.

The Solution: Maha

Maha is not a campaign. It is not a one-time event. It is a replicable educational ecosystem that can operate independently of any single person, school, or sanctuary.

It is built on a foundational philosophy: that the relationship between humans and animals must be rooted in respect and equality, not sentimentality or pity. We do not ask children to feel sorry for animals. We invite them to see animals as fellow living beings: and to understand what that means for how we eat, how we live, and what kind of world we build together.

The Five Tools

Maha is not a single program. It is five complementary tools that together form a complete educational ecosystem, each one reinforcing the others, each one designed to work independently and at scale.

Proof of Concept

What Happens When a School Visits Today

• Guided tour of the sanctuary: children meet the animals in a structured, intentional way
• Facilitated reflection activities: guided questions connect the experience to food choices, empathy, and values
• Take-home materials: children leave with resources that extend the learning into their homes and families
• Teacher follow-up: post-visit engagement ensures the experience is integrated into the classroom

This is not an excursion. This is an educational program. Maha takes this model, systematizes it, and makes it available to every school that cannot travel to Colombia: and every sanctuary that wants to replicate it in their own country.

Theory of Change

How does a school visit in Colombia become a shift in food culture across Latin America? The chain of change works like this:

• A child participates in the Maha curriculum: through a sanctuary visit, classroom materials, or a short film.
• The child’s understanding of animals shifts: from ‘food source’ to ‘fellow living being.’ This is measured before and after.
• The child brings questions, conversations, and materials home. Parents engage. Family food conversations change.
• The teacher, now equipped with the curriculum, repeats the program with the next cohort: without needing Juliana or the sanctuary.
• The school achieves Maha certification: an institutional signal that attracts other schools, media, and government attention.
• A sanctuary in Ecuador, Peru, or Brazil adopts the same curriculum: extending the network without central coordination.
• In 10 years, an entire generation in Latin America’s meat-exporting countries has grown up with a fundamentally different relationship to animals and food.

The critical insight: the theory of change does not depend on any single actor. The curriculum can run without Juliana. The certification can be awarded without the founding sanctuary. The network grows through its own gravity: because schools want the certification, sanctuaries want the legitimacy, and children want to understand.

Measurability

Every layer of Maha is measurable. We are not asking funders to trust a vision: we are asking them to track a system.

Year 1 Plan: Colombia + 2 Countries

The Team

Why Kickstarting For Good

K4G’s framework maps precisely onto what Maha is:

The Institutional Backbone

Behind Maha sit two established organizations: Juliana’s Animal Sanctuary (U.S. 501(c)(3), GFAS-verified, 23 years) and Food Yoga International: a global food relief network operating in 60+ countries. This is not a startup with a dream. It is a proven operation seeking the structural and financial support to make a working model global.