Provisional Area Reserve for the Kugapakori and Nahua Amazon Communities in Trouble
The primitive Kugapakori and Nahua Amazon societies, living in the jungle and the Ceja de Selva, have long been intimidated, since the time of the rubber extraction and the discovery of this area as \”virgin land\” to be exploited for wood. These native communities have suffered a great demographic loss from contact with the national society that produced a \”shock.\” The effects on their health, economy, and social dynamics place their existence at risk. Because of this, in 1990 a ministerial resolution officially recognized the area they inhabit, the headwaters of the Ticumpina and Mishagua rivers, the immediate tributaries of the Urubamba in the Cuzco jungle, as provisional native reserve area.
However, between 2001 and 2002, Pluspetrol entered the area to extract gas. Their activities produce constant noise and movement by the workers, helicopters, machinery and other equipment, etc. According to Mr. Alberto Romero, an anthropologist in the Centro de Desarrollo del Indigína Amazónico (CEDIA), \”this has caused displacement of the fauna and the natives have taken refuge even deeper in the jungle.\” The State recently issued a supreme decree protecting the legal creation of the reserve. This measure, however, is not effective. There is no organization to appropriately monitor Pluspetrol\’s actions due to lack of funds.
Primitive Amazonians
The Kugapakori and Nahua clans are composed of single-family nuclei and they migrate within a social habitat area. Their migratory dynamic is the essential part of their economy. The primitive society system is based on the conservation of equilibrium between the use of natural resources and the satisfaction of their material needs. Any ecological imbalance in their habitat will place their survival at risk.
Both of these Amazon communities engage in economic activities such as hunting, fishing, agriculture, and harvesting. However, they take refuge in areas that are difficult to access for national society. They now inhabit lands where wildlife resources are being exhausted rapidly. Nearly the entire zone they actually occupy is of a lowered density of hunting animals, the soil is quite eroded, rocky, and poor. It is a closed ecosystem with only the nutrients recycle. Due to a shortage of fruit, the natives have always migrated throughout the area. Now, their way of life is being affected by many activities such as the Camisea Gas Project, timber activity, evangelization, among others.
In the adjacent jungle to the habitat to the Kugapakoris the Nahuas Amazon society develops, specifically in the Sapahua region, in the Atalaya province in the departamento de Ucayail. They live in the highest parts of the interfluvial forests of the headwaters of the Manu, Camisea, and Mishagua rivers and their tributaries such as Serjali, de las Piedras, Sepahua, and Purús from 300 to 1500m (985 to 4925ft) above sea level.
The Nahuas, like the Kugapakoris, are nomads. They have a large migration path and depend on gathering more than they do hunting to survive. They paths they move in are historic, annual, and seasonal cycles as well as for sociocultural and political reasons. This dynamic is an integral part of their economy and it is well adapted to the environment. It is not predatory or exploitative but autonomous and self-sufficient. The Nahua social structure is flexible and mobile because the establishments are not dependent on a fixed population. An autonomous production unit is equivalent to a familial unit; they are free to migrate independently. The population movements are within a political system of economic trade, rituals, marriages, alliances, wars, and courtesy visits.
CEDIA proposes that the Kugapakori Nahua reserved provisional area should comprise all the territory inhabited by the ethnic groups, that is to say, the entire migratory area. As a migratory area, this research organization, would have it be a socially inhabited space with: residential nuclei, adjacent area, small farms, ravines, hunting zones, area for daily activities, potentials (future small farms, hunting zones, new fishing waters, new establishments), and recovery zones for ichthyological fauna.1
The above criteria have been developed based on the ethnic groups\’ \”cosmovision\” (religious, cultural world-view). For example, every ravine and geographical feature has a name and they are part of a distant historical event. They are considered an integral part of their world of spiritual beliefs. Further, the communication between ravines, rivers, and trails gives coherence to the territory. In this manner they are able to maintain relations with relatives and allies. This confirms the notion of an integrated land.
Pluspetrol, therefore, is an outsider and an invader. The resource exploitation within the zone goes against the objectives of the reserve in principal: by establishing a land region for them, the permanence of these groups in their habitat would be guaranteed.2 Foreign companies pose the greatest threat to the Kugapakori and Nahua exploiting their lands and interfering with their way of life.
1 Informe Técnico, Asunto: Sustentación de Reserva de Tierras del Estado a favor de Grupos Nativos Kugapakori y Nahua, 29 de agosto de 1988. \”Un espacio socialmente habitado: núcleos residenciales, áreas adyacentes, chacras, quebradas, zonas de caza, actividades cotidianas, potenciales (futuras chacras, zonas de caza, nuevas aguas de pesca, nuevos asentamientos) y en recuperación (fauna ictiológica)\”
2 Ministerial Resolution Document #00046-90 AG/DRAAR done by the Unidad Agraria Departmental de Cuzco technical personnel based on the studies and actions of determination of 443,887 has. in the Echarate and Sepahua districts, Provincia de la Convención, departamento de Cuzco, and Atalaya, departamento de Ucayali. \”Se garantizaría la permanencia de estos grupos humanos en su hábitat, estableciendo una región de tierras a favor de ellos.\”
ParksWatch-Peru: November 7, 2003
By: Inés Verá Pinzás