Why Aretha Duarte Decided to Climb Everest for Social Impact
With nearly a decade of high-altitude experience, the Brazilian mountaineer leveraged the world's highest peak to fund social projects.
Before aiming for the roof of the world, Aretha Duarte built nearly a decade of high-altitude mountaineering experience working as a guide. Speaking on the XTREMMA Sports podcast, she shares the turning point in 2020 that transformed her Everest climb into a tool for social impact.
Nearly a decade of high-altitude experience
Before setting foot on the roof of the world, Aretha Duarte had already built a solid track record in high-altitude mountaineering. Working professionally for nearly a decade with the expedition agency Grade 6, she explored several mountain ranges without ever traveling for purely personal goals or self-funding her climbs. Her professional background included four summits of Aconcagua—following an initial trip to base camp—alongside expeditions in Bolivia, Ecuador, Mount Elbrus, and Mount Kilimanjaro, as well as a prior trek to Everest Base Camp.
For Duarte, however, dates, exact summit counts, and statistics always took a backseat. In a conversation with Shubi Guimarães on the XTREMMA Sports podcast, she emphasized that what stays with her are the lessons, the camaraderie, and the overall journey, setting aside chronological details she views as secondary to her lived mountain experiences.
Initial reluctance toward Everest and the 2020 turning point
For years, Mount Everest was not on Duarte's radar. The mountain held little appeal due to three key factors: the pursuit of status surrounding the world's tallest peak (despite not being the most technically challenging), a roughly 1% fatality rate per season, and the prohibitive expedition cost, estimated between $67,000 and $70,000 at the time.
Her perspective shifted in March 2020 at the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic. Reflecting on her career, Duarte realized she had not yet brought to life the social initiatives for underprivileged youth she had envisioned since her physical education college days. She saw Everest as the platform needed to generate visibility, attract partners, and make those socio-environmental initiatives a reality.
From Scrap to Everest
With her physical conditioning and technical expertise in rock, ice, and 7,000-meter-plus high-altitude mountaineering already honed through her professional routine, the primary obstacle was financial. To raise the necessary funds, Duarte revived a strategy from her childhood: collecting and selling recyclable materials.
The initiative gave rise to the Da Sucata ao Everest (From Scrap to Everest) campaign, mobilizing family members—including her 93-year-old grandmother—friends, and volunteers over 13 months of continuous effort. Far beyond the athletic milestone of reaching 8,848 meters, the primary goal was always the social transformation the journey could create.