ECUADOR

People and Plants works closely with Sacha Warmi, an Ecuadorian grassroots organization that supports indigenous groups in Amazonian Ecuador to revitalize their local practices, know-how and institutions in ways that improve wellbeing, as understood and defined by indigenous people. Created in 2018 and run by a team of five, mostly indigenous, practitioners, Sacha Warmi draws on decades of experience developing the concept of intercultural health in ways that recognize and support its biocultural, holistic and dynamic nature as embodied in forests and cultural landscapes.

This program, holistic in its approach, seeks to support the Amazonian Indigenous Kichwa people of the Lower Kuraray River in their efforts to manage their territory and natural resources to keep it in a good state of conservation, Sumak Allpa, applying their traditional knowledge and practices – Sacha Runa Yachay – to achieve a dignified quality of life that provides the basic needs so that people can improve the levels of "good living" or Sumak Kawsay.

Between 2004 and 2008 the Kichwa of the lower Kuraray River achieved official recognition as an ancestral indigenous group (Pueblo Ancestral Kichwa Kawsak Sacha), which included legal rights over 199,256 hectares of their ancestral lands, in a region of high biodiversity, next to the Yasuni National Park and the Tagaeri -Taromenane Intangible Zone. Although to this day the territory of Pueblo Ancestral Kichwa Kawsak Sacha remains in a good state of conservation, the seven communities that comprise it are facing some important threats and challenges, including:

• External pressures on their lands due to a) Illegal extraction of timber and assorted forest resources and an insufficient response from State institutions; and b) emerging threats from oil and gas development.

• Internal problems such as a) Non-compliance and internal conflicts over the rules of use and management of the different uses and conservation zones established in the management plan, b) Difficulties managing State funds, c) Weak governance and an inadequate institutional capacity to respond the needs and problems of the communities, d) Lack of resources and technical capacities, [3.3] Poor access to formal education suited to the local reality, f) Linguistic and socio-cultural erosion, g) Poor access to cosmopolitan health care services coupled with the gradual loss of their own traditional health-care delivery knowledge and practices, h) Lack of economic opportunities and alternatives to cover essential needs and for the acquisition of basic products.

• Our program seeks to engage with the above problems as a way of supporting the protection, resilience and coexistence of Kichwa culture and communities, so as to achieve the expected impacts/results by supporting or improving community-level skills, capacities and infrastructures in a way that increases self-sufficiency and ecological and social resilience. We seek funding to continue to work along several interrelated and mutually supported fronts:

1. Local organizational and governance capacities: We aim to provide mentoring and support to community leaders in their effort to manage their own affairs and interact with external state and non-stage agent by, for instance, helping them develop working plans, acquire the necessary skills to navigate through complex government programs such as Socio-bosque, and develop more effective mechanisms for community-wide participation and decision- making.

2. Critical services and infrastructure: Like so many indigenous communities, the communities in the lower Kuraray lack adequate access to potable water, sanitation and adequate communications in ways that underwrite their resilience to socio-environmental change. Following their request, we support communities in their search to improve their existing infrastructure through the use of appropriate and accessible technologies and mechanisms, including: solar water pumps systems, simple low-cost but effective household latrines, community access to WiFi and basic computer access and literacy.

3. Health care: Building on a long history and experience in other communities and settings we draw on a range of tools and mechanisms (workshops, peer-to-peer exchanges) to support the process of revalorization of endogenous health-care delivery practices and knowledge including the preparation of plant-based remedies. In the largest community we will be working directly with the medical center in an effort to improve understanding and the relationship between medical systems

4. Education: Working with consultants with experience in inter-cultural education we aim to support state teachers working in Kichwa schools in order to help them in their ongoing efforts to adapt the formal curriculum to the needs and cultural context of indigenous children, working to prevent the loss and strengthen the local language (Runashimi).

5. Climate change resilience: In light of increased frequency and severity of extreme weather events, especially flooding, we are seeking ways to help communities develop appropriate mitigation mechanisms.

6. Support for Kichwa students in the city of Puyo: We are seeking to provide mentorship and academic and social support to the 30+ Kichwa youth studying and living in Puyo, far away from their communities and their social and cultural support systems, often under conditions of precarity, exclusion and alienation.

7. Creation of a documentary archive for the recovery of cultural memory and artistic production: Building on our extensive experience and pool of trained Kichwa video practitioners we aim to develop a program in the communities of the Lower Kuraray on matters relating to cultural documentation, revival and peer-to-peer learning. Partnering with the Lab of Applied Bioacoustics, the Sacha Taki initiative is documenting the biocultural soundscapes of Kawsak Sacha.

8. Community monitoring of and responses to extractivist threats: Our aim is to support communities in their ongoing efforts to guard their territories from the onslaught of outside poachers (mostly Peruvians, entering the area from the Kuraray River) illegally harvesting timber, game, turtle eggs and fish.

9. Developing income streams that are generative, not destructive, of biodiversity: We have identified two priority areas; first working with different stakeholders, and especially women, to support the production and sale of forest-based crafts (ceramics, carvings, basketry, jewelry) by providing technical support and assistance where needed (for instance, improving quality, supporting innovation and marketing). 

Partners