Support Shipibo-Konibo Change Makers

Following up on our commitment to Paohyan:

On Friday, September 8th, 6 volunteers from Alianza Arkana returned to Paohyan, a 1,000 person Shipibo community 5 hours away by fast motor boat. As promised, the volunteers returned to continue their collaboration with the community on climate change education. Arriving in Paohyan on Friday afternoon, they began preparations for the two-day workshop, on climate change and alternative sustainable sources of income.  Alianza Arkana’s Director of Permaculture, Marcos Urquia, joined the volunteers and played a critical role in inspiring the participants to think of creative local solutions to combat climate change.

This workshop was what volunteer Karl Vikat called, a “response to a demand.” After the leader of the community, Limber, attended an impactful workshop on climate change put on by the USAID, he called upon Alianza Arkana to provide the community with a similar educational workshop. Limber noted, "the community does not have access to this information or news on the dramatic global effects of climate change. We need this knowledge."

On Saturday, 30 to 40 men, women, and youth came to learn about the local and global impacts of climate change. Participants watched video clips, engaged in small group discussions, and got to talk openly about how climate change impacted their day to day lives and long standing cultural traditions. One of the community leaders reflected on the day saying, "I never knew about these things happening all over the world, and it makes me fearful for my children, grandchildren, and future generations to come."

Feeling motivated on Sunday, the community picked up where they left off and talked about creating their own solution to the local effects of climate change-- a botanic garden. Marcos presented the Permaculture project in Santa Clara, focused on the three goals of the garden. First being reforestation and protection against fire. Second being food security and nutrition. Third being preservation of plant knowledge. Marcos inspired the community to focus on what garden could bring to the community in terms of income and agricultural education for youth.

After seeing the excitement and motivation to collaborate with Alianza Arkana, the volunteers agree this was the beginning of a new relationship with the community of Paohyan.

Over the past three months, Alianza Arkana’s ecosocial justice programme has been active across a wide array of areas.

First, we conducted research on the Amazonian Economy in the native community of Nuevo Saposoa within our broader aim of encouraging sound management of natural resources and sustainable economic activity in Shipibo communities. Based on that research and in response to community demand, Alianza Arkana supported Nuevo Saposoa in its efforts to officially classify its forest as a ‘recurso turistico’. This work aimed at promoting ecotourism in the community, which is located at the very edge of the Sierra del Divisor national park. Thanks to our engagement, the regional government body responsible for commerce and tourism, DIRCETOR (Dirección Regional de Comercio Exterior y Turismo), included Nuevo Saposoa in the national inventory for touristic resources.

In the same vein, Alianza Arkana has assisted the community as it aims to gain access to electricity. We are working together with the regional government in order for each household in the community to have solar panels for lighting. As a result of our concerted efforts, installation of the panels in Nuevo Saposoa is expected to take place in the coming weeks.

 Moreover, we organised a 3-day video-editing workshop in conjunction with the indigenous communicators network REDCIP (Red de Comunicadores Indígenas de Perú) and youth of the regional indigenous organisation FECONAU (Federación de Comunidades Nativas de Ucayali) in our offices at Yarinacocha. Drawing on footage of the indigenous peoples’ march in Pucallpa on the 5^th of June taken by volunteers of Alianza Arkana as well as our collaborators, we supported 15 talented Shipibo men and women both young and old in creating their own story of the event. Using free and easily accessible software (Windows Movie Maker), we strived to empower participants with fundamental skills that can serve them in promoting Shipibo culture and advocating for their rights.

Finally, Alianza Arkana together with two independent Shipibo collaborators led a workshop in the native community of Pahoyan over the course of one day, preparing the ground for a multi-day workshop on climate change and alternative sustainable sources of income scheduled for fall this year. The workshop helped to identify core needs as well as matters of concern of the community, and set in motion the preparations for discussing potential solutions to these later this year. As part of the workshop, a diverse group made up of more than 20 women, men, children, adolescents and elders participated in drawing their very own maps of the community, as well creating a communal map as a tool to identify the priority areas they would want to work on.