YINE PROJECT DESCRIPTION (Draft)

I.   Presentation of people involved in the project

The Yine of Manu

In an area about 5 times the size of the United Kingdom and with a population less than half, Peru has a vast cultural diversity with over 90 culturally distinct groups. This is only surpassed by its natural biodiversity.

The story of this diversity spans many centuries and conquests and is intimately related to the diversity of terrain, which extends from the barren desert on its coastline to the plains of the north, to the majestic Andes, to the lush valleys of the Urubamba and, last but not least, the luxuriant tropical rainforest to the east. Nowhere is the culture less understood and under greater threat than in the southern parts of the selva. It is incredible to think that in this day and age there remain un-contacted peoples in the thousands of square miles of still unexplored areas of Peru's rainforest.

In a corner of the southern forest lies the Manu Biosphere Reserve. A small enclave, approximately half the size of Holland, Manu boasts one of the highest biodiversities on this planet. It is also home to ten culturally distinct groups of peoples; the Cashinahua, the Masho-Piro, the Yora or Yaminahua, the Amahuaca, the Matsiguenka, the Amarakaeri, the Huachipaeri, the Yine or Piro, the Quechuans, and the Spanish speaking colonists. This does not include those as yet undiscovered peoples in its heart.

Of these, one of the most interesting are Manu's Piro indians, both for their strong cultural identity and historical narrative. Today the Manu Piro indians are a population numbering about 300 individuals, that live in Diamante, a community nestling on the banks of the Río Alto Madre de Dios, on the fringe of the Manu Biosphere. Several hundred more live in organized communities in the Alto Ucayali, the river Cashabatay, the lower Urubamba and the mouth of the River Tambo. The Piro Indians appear in the records as long ago as 1576 and were probably trading long before this. At this time there is no mention of the Piro in Manu, but the Piros or ´Chontaquiros´ maintained trade relations with the Incas in the region of the Pongo de Mañique, for which they made frequent excursions into the upper and lower Urubamba, bringing back parrots, macaws, clothing, cedar canoes, cacao, resins and often looting populations of Matsiguenka for their women. These would then be traded with the Incas for metalwork and tools and later with the Spanish for items that they could trade to other tribes lower down river. The Piro were so well travelled that various explorers reported the existence of many who spoke Quechua, Matsiguenka, Conibo, Amahuaca, Spanish and even Portuguese. The chronicles of Franciscan Missionaries from the 1770´s describe the Piros as ´a sociable people unique in their cleanliness and almost civilized´. Many explorers therefore found them welcoming and effective trade partners with a unique knowledge of the region.

With the influx of missionaries to the region and then the start of the rubber boom, however, the life of the Piros, as so many native peoples, was to change irrevocably. The Piros themselves were co-opted as intermediaries by the rubber barons and used to enslave other tribes. In 1891, a poor rubber tapper, Lache, followed a Campa indian guide up the Serjali river system, walked for an hour over hilly jungle trail, and discovered another river system, an opposite system flowing south. Continuing down, he encountered the Manu and Madre de Dios and then Bolivia. By 1892 a young Peruvian, Carlos Fitzcaraldo, had established his headquarters on the Alto Mishagua River. Travelling with an army of Campo and Piro Indians, he travelled up the Camisea River and following an indian trail arrived at the headwaters of the Río Manu. A new era had begun. In 1896, with over 1000 Piro and Campa Indians, Fitzcaraldo cleared a wide path between the Serjali and Caspajali rivers and carried the superstructure of his steam boat, the Contamana, over the pass that now carries his name. The first native populations he encountered were the same Piros and further downriver a mixed population of Piros and Mashcos. This is the first record of the Piro in Manu. Fitzcaraldo quickly organized the systematic suppression and enslavery of the native population for the purpose of extracting rubber.

In the following couple of decades many tribes, including the Piro, found their numbers reduced and widely scattered. The Piros remaining in Manu moved further down river and mingled mainly with the Matsiguenka who they learned to live with. Those in Urubamba now no longer traded and found their lives further influenced by the influx of Christian ideology. While many cultures were permanently changed by the dispersal and diminishing numbers, the Piro maintained their identity and culture. They were accustomed to intermingling with others, but, probably what served them best was the matriarchal line of inheritance; a child born to a Piro woman, irrespective of the paternal culture, was Piro by birth. Furthermore, elder women strongly influence everyday decisions in the community. So while men came and went, there remained in the communities a core of women who were able to perpetuate the culture.

In the years subsequent to the rubber boom, the Piros in Manu  worked in agri-communities/haciendas that superseded the rubber plantations, and this pattern continued until the 50´s. At this time, a large group of Piro moved to the mouth of the Río Pinquen and subsequently to the mouth of the Alto Madre de Dios, where they are found today. At this time they were hunters for skins and pelt for the emerging trade in the civilized world. With the gradual migration down river and the formation of the Manu Biosphere Reserve, the gap between the Piro communities in Urubamba and Manu has forever widened, but, there is still a steady flow of individuals between the communities via the Manu River. In Urubamba the traditional practices are today stronger than they are in Manu. Firstly because the communities are bigger, but also because overall there has been less contact with the outside world. The communities of Urubamba and Diamante thus have very distinct social practices and dialects. In the 50´s the first school was established in Diamante by the evangelists. Thus the majority of the Piro in Manu are today Christians and the influence of shamanism is very weak. Nevertheless, their sense of identity remains strong, they retain many traditional practices  which have been perpetuated by the elder women. Today the Piros operate small chacras, farmsteads, in the floodplain of the Madre de Dios, growing yucca, bananas, beans, corn, peanuts, pumpkin and cotton. Aside from fresh meat, their principal diet consists of bananas, yucca and fish. Produce is sold locally, and there is seasonal employment in the recovery of valuable driftwoods. Many men are employed in transportation up and down the Madre de Dios.

In the last few years there has been a revival of their culture. And they have defined their authentic denomination Yine, which means ´human being´, reclaiming the right to be called according their cultural heritage.

Pantiacolla Tours

Gustavo Moscoso and Marianne van Vlaardingen jointly own a company, Pantiacolla Tours, in Cusco, Peru. Pantiacolla Tours, has specialized in the Manu Biosphere Reserve since 1990. Both Marianne and Gustavo, possess unique expertise in the area.

Gustavo was born in Manu in 1960. His parents, Peruvians from Polish-Italian descent, were the first colonists of the Alto Madre de Dios. Their homestead stood opposite what is now the Diamante community and during Gustavo's early childhood his father, Don Isaac, traded meat and vegetables with the workers of an oil exploration company, located at Boca Manu. Gustavo grew up with the Yine and many of his childhood friends are now community leaders.

Marianne was born in 1959 in Utrecht, a friendly university town in Holland. Marianne has been very influenced by the Dutch atmosphere of friendship and reciprocity. Her father was Dutch of Indonesian descent bringing many tropical scents and sounds into an otherwise typical Dutch household. Stories about the land of his birth and the animals and forests there, instilled in her an intense curiosity for tropics which eventually led her to study biology at university. In the 80´s she visited the rainforests of the Guyanas and Brazil, assisting in ecological research and exploring the ríos Branco and Negro in a 7m long canoe. In 1987-89 she studied saddle-back tamarins in Manu's Biological Station Cocha Cashu and afterwards became a guide,  living a total of 6 years inside Manu.

In 1994 Marianne and Gustavo established Pantiacolla Tours which in 1999 was elected the best eco-tourist company operating Manu. Pantiacolla is a company born out an interest and concern for our natural environment and it continues to demonstrate this concern. As is has grown, Pantiacolla has been able to re-invest in research and education and now finds itself in a position to develop valuable sustainable projects with indigenous peoples.

Conservation of the rainforest depends inextricably on cooperation with local people. These people whom have an unsurpassed knowledge of the forest and for whom the forest is their home are often dragged into the 21^st century in a way which exploits both their culture and the forest that is their home, and inevitably deprives them of both.

Understanding these peoples is therefore vital in understanding the rainforest. Pantiacolla has been looking for cooperation with native peoples for some time. Until now, all projects executed in the Multiple Use Zone of the Manu Biosphere Reserve have been  by local and national NGO´. Most of these projects have failed. They have failed through an intrinsic lack of understanding of the area its peoples and the cost of the logistics of setting up the project in the first instance. Being an established commercial tour company in the area, Pantiacolla has the advantage of not having to spend large amounts of money on logistics; it can utilize the transport, contacts, communication and manpower currently provided for tourism with little injection of extra capital.

II. Description of the Project

A. How it came about

Pantiacolla Tours has been administrator for the landing strip of Boca Manu over the last four years. This landing strip is on Diamante territorial lands. The Yine indians preferred an outside company to be in charge of its administration, due to lack of inside expertise. This cooperation is being fulfilled to the entire satisfaction of both parties involved, mainly through Gustavo´s contacts and knowledge of the Diamante community.

In recent years the question about Yine participation in eco-tourism has been presented to Pantiacolla Tours with frequency by the community of Diamante. This culminated in August 1999, with a proposal to the Diamante community for the construction of an eco-lodge on an equal partnership basis. The proposal was turned down by the Yine indians on two grounds. First, they had been disappointed many times by the initiatives of local NGO's, who had required a high work input on the Yine's behalf for a promised long term gain. Without exception, the long-term reward never came and the NGO’s left. Secondly, they felt the need for a direct financial input by translating their work into a salary instead of shares in a lodge.

Pantiacolla´s second proposal therefore addressed both these concerns. Firstly, the Diamante community would participate in the construction phases of the eco-lodge on a contract basis, meaning they would be paid for the material delivered and work undertaken. Secondly,  after ten years from the date of the contract the lodge would be transferred to and run by the Diamante Community. In the mean time Pantiacolla would commit itself to support the community in sustainable projects related to the eco-lodge, providing a general training for the Diamantinos to understand the desires and needs of the western tourists and a specialized training to a selected group of Yine indians who then would manage the eco-lodge at the end of the 10-year term.

B. What are our goals

At a conservational level:

Our aim is to conserve the tropical rainforest of the Madre de Dios department. And we believe that real conservational power can only be achieved when local peoples understand, participate in and benefit from eco-tourism projects. This observation has been made by many initiatives all over the world.

Following their example, the Yine Project hopes to become another, positive, example from which other projects all over the world, can learn. For our part, Madre de Dios Explorations hopes to be instrumental in setting up similar projects throughout the  Madre de Dios area, thereby providing a network of nuclei from where conservation ideas can permeate  not only the undisturbed regions of the department, but especially those parts already affected by human exploitation in order to recuperate them.

At a business level:

Madre de Dios Explorations SA (Pantiacolla Tours and Ryan Burtoft) expect to do profitable business with the Yine Lodge, and revenues will be used to propagate similar projects in the rest of the Department Madre de Dios.

Pantiacolla Tours also anticipates increasing its sale of Manu tours by incorporating meetings and communication with the Yine indians in their standard tours.

As a pre-condition, it requires that the areas natural resources are protected to ensure future business possibilities.

At the community level

The Yine community wishes to be involved in eco-tourism and conservation and to provide long-term income for the community. Such income will be used to transport sick or injured Diamantinos to Cusco and to pay for their treatment there. It will also be used to enable them to attend  meetings with the NGO´s that unite indians from different regions. This will give them a greater say in local and wider issues that affect their lives.

C. What have we achieved till now

Lodge: The foundations  have been laid for all of the 12 hexagonal bungalows, the restaurant and kitchen and the house for the personal. The Diamantinos have been contracted for collecting and selling us material such as palm leaves for the roofs. This phase is expected to be completed within the next month, from where the actual construction of all buildings can begin. For this, Diamantinos will also be contracted. The Lodge Project will be completely financed by Madre de Dios Explorations SA.

Yine Education: Contacts have been made with the Amauta Spanish School in Cusco. Amauta has many volunteer projects, for which their Spanish language students can be placed after sufficient study of Spanish. The Yine Project will make use of the Amauta set up to receive students with sufficient knowledge of the Spanish language to be able to communicate with the Yine indians.

Instruction will mainly be given through theatre acts (Theatre for the Oppressed, Agusto Boal). Contact has been sought with an actor experienced in this type of theatre, who currently is writing a  ´script´ with acts to teach the Yine. The script will be used by the volunteers to instruct the Yine indians on specific tasks in the lodge.

For selected individuals, who will work in administration and management, schooling will take place outside the native community.

III. About the Yine Foundation

A. Goal of the Yine Foundation

The Foundation will collect and manage funds for specific Yine projects. This does not include the construction and implementation of the lodge.

Description of projects funded by the Yine Foundation

1. Nourishment:

a. Agriculture: Local fruits and vegetables will be produced in a sustainable way in coordination with the lodge's restaurant for its provision. Also non-perishable and elaborated products will be available for sale to tourists.

b. Breeding of local animals: Capybara, curasaw and catfish will be selected for breeding in small for consumption in the restaurant.

c. Preparation of traditional dishes to be tasted by tourists: Traditional dishes, prepared with western hygiene practices, will be bought by the restaurant for tourists to sample.

2. Handicrafts

a. Recovery of craftsmanship and production of handicrafts, bows and arrows, etc in quantity: Many handicraft products have gone out of use these days, and especially the younger Yine indians have no experience in crafting them. Craftsmanship will be recorded in writing and photography for reference and use by the younger Yine indians.

b. Sale to tourists: Basic administration skills will be taught by volunteers such as the  presentation of products in the handicraft store, general ´sales talk´ and accountancy of income and expenses.

3.  History (legends) and local knowledge

For posterity, the ledgers will be started for;

a. The recording and production of a Yine book for history and local knowledge

b. Yine guides to explain history and local knowledge to tourists

4.  Music and dance

a. The recovery and recording of original music and dancing.

b. A group of paid dancers may then perform for tourists  visiting the community.

Training of Yine indians for acquisition of abilities to be used in lodge functions and daily life

1. Yine training for the following lodge functions: cleaning, cooking, serving, lodge maintenance, bartending

2. Long-term Yine training for management functions: A selective group of Yine indians will receive secondary school training outside of Diamante. Those that adapt best to the school system will be selected for university training

3. Medical training: The following  initiatives will be taken: (a) First aid courses : These will merge modern medicine with as much of the local knowledge and products as possible. (b) First aid kits and a treatment room: these will be made available with a refrigerator to keep perishable medicines.

4. General knowledge training: Volunteers from all over the world are invited to tell about their countries and the way they live there. Wherever possible, photos, slides and visual aids will be used.

5. English: (a) Basic English courses for all will be provided to enable communication with foreigners (b) Intermediate courses will be provided for those working at the lodge.

 6. Ecology training (environmental awareness, sustainable use of natural resources): Combined with the information the Yine have about the environment, a basic ecology course will be taught. Its principle aims being to reach a global environmental awareness and a technical understanding of sustainable use of natural resources among the Yine.

B. How can you participate

As a volunteer:

General volunteers are expected to speak Spanish on an intermediate level and to have had at least 3 years of work experience. They will be trained in our theatre instruction methods and receive general preparation for one week in Cusco, after which they will be integrated in the Yine program at the Diamante Community.

Specialized volunteers, such as agricultural workers, cooks, medical doctors, English teachers and biologists will be asked to dictate special courses for which the Yine Indians can sign up. Anthropologists will record the Yine history and local knowledge.

As a financial donor:

Money is needed for all  aspects of the project.

Click here for further information about Pantiacolla Tours  

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