News from ITLA - Peru Conference

20.10.2011,

Dear colleagues and lovers of terraced landscapes and cultures,

Today is a short mail about the progress for the World Conference on Terraced Landscapes, Biodiversity and Cultures 2013. The organising committee met on October 6 at the meeting room of the Social Science Department of the Catholic University in Lima to discuss about the preparations for the World Conference. In short, we agreed to hold the Planning Workshop for the World Conference in Lima on January 25th of 2012, when we shall define dates, format, topics, teams, budget and preparatory work.

For the preparations in Peru the group of organisers decided several steps:
 First, to organise an exchange meeting on the inventory of terraced landscapes in Peru on Nov. 11 in Lima - since more than 20 years ago there have been efforts to have the national inventory of terraces, which had not been completed. There are calculations of about 1 million has. of pre-hispanic terraced landscapes in Peru, and about 20 % of this area is still used for agricultural and ceremonial
purposes. In November we want to analyse the progress of the inventory and discuss next steps in coordination with the experts in this field. This is also a pre-condition for a National Project funded by
World Bank and the IDB to protect and preserve terraced landscapes in Peru.
 Second, the participating activists, researchers and institutions will organise in 2012 regional encounters in different areas of Peru, for example, in the North-East in Chachapoyas, in Lima, in Ayacucho and Apurimac, in Arequipa, in Cusco and Puno. The aim of the regional encounters is to motivate case studies about specific terraced landscapes, identify local researchers and to connect with experienced farmers with regard to terraces and water management, construction of dry stone walls, soil recovery, biodiversity and traditional plant varieties and local wisdom and culture with regard to terraces. The different case studies and the local farmers (male and female) will be helpful to identify the areas for the pre-conference field work (which is planned as an open exchange between local terrace specialists and the foreign visitors) and the Peruvian representatives for the Farmer Forum during the Conference.
 Finally, the Italian section of ITLA is elaborating a research proposal for the European Commission in Brussels, which will also involve the ITLA coordination and several research organisations from Peru: the Catholic University (Environment and Society Group), the Centro Bartolomé de las Casas (Water and territory group) from Cusco, CITPA and the Cusichaca Groups.

For the planning workshop in January in Lima we ask you (all) to send in your preparatory work with regard to:
 Inventory
 Case studies
 Identification of local farmers (experts)

For 2012 we want to develop an inventory of terraced landscapes in the world, and we want to contact researchers from all over the world to become affiliated members of ITLA. This will allow us to prepare a world map of terraces. Please send your suggestions.

In the last 2 months about 10 researchers from Spain (different regions including the Canary Islands) have send in their affiliation to ITLA, increasing our members of the World Alliance to more than 70 researchers and activists. Thanks to Sabina Asins in Valencia Spain is now present in our alliance. Best regards from Raqchi, near Cusco, where terraces exist for thousands of years. We attach 2 photos from Moray, near Cusco, which has been an experimentation center for the
domestication of Andean crops. The photos were taken by Maruja last week, during the training workshop (10 days) on Participatory Action Research, which we directed in coordination with the Center Bartolome de las Casas in Cusco.

Timmi Tillmann and Maruja Salas

Advisors of Right Livelihood College at Center for Policy Research and International Studies, Universiti Sains Malaysia, timmitillmann@gmail.com