PERU
Natural Disaster Prevention, Education & Climate Change Programs

Background

Peru is the most ecologically diverse country on the planet, with 87 out of the world’s total 104 ecosystems. The Atacama Desert, the driest in the world, sprawls across much of Peru’s coast. The Andes, snow-capped and covered with glaciers, rise to over 22,000 feet to form the world’s second-highest mountain range. Where the Andes drop, the lush Amazon rain forest begins.

Peru’s cultures are as diverse as its geography. The Inca Empire, known for its stone citadels and elaborate sun temples, was just one of a dozen ancient cultures that took root in Peru. The Inca’s legacy continues today in the lives and language of 8 million Quechua-speaking highlanders. On the coast, Peru’s culture is an exotic cocktail of African, Chinese, Japanese, Spanish and indigenous peoples who have blended over the last five centuries. In the Amazon there are 43 distinct ethnic groups, each with their own language.

Issues

Despite its rich culture, Peru is an exceedingly poor country. More than half of Peru’s population live beneath the poverty line and a quarter live in extreme poverty. Forty percent of all Peruvians live in the informal economy – that is, they live in isolated country hamlets of disenfranchised city slums and eke out a living outside of government taxes and services.

Poverty has become even more of a problem in Southern Peru following a massive earthquake on August 15, 2007. The quake, which measured 7.9 on the Richter scale, killed over 500 people and destroyed tens of thousands of homes. Peruvians will be recovering from this earthquake for years to come.

Peru also ranks third in the world for adverse impacts from climate change, according to the UK’s Tyndall Centre on Climate Change. These include dramatic ecological changes in the Amazon basin and rapid melting – up to 100 vertical feet per year – of Peru’s glaciers, which produce water for Peru’s major cities and farming operations on the coast. Rainfall patterns have also changed across the country and the country’s fishing industry is hard-hit by changes in ocean temperatures caused by El Niño weather patterns.

Solutions

World Leadership School has programs in all three geographic areas of Peru – El Carmen on the desert coast, Ollantaytambo in the Andes and Puerto Maldonado in the Amazon. The issues we study and work on vary according to location and groups are free to visit more than one project during their time in Peru. Requirements for Peru programs are listed at the bottom of this page.

Read some recent trip blogs here...

El Carmen – Natural Disaster Prevention and Mitigation

The town of El Carmen, on Peru’s desert coast, is the heartbeat of Afro-Peruvian culture, which flavors much of Peru’s music, cooking, art, dance and pop culture. The area was the center of Peru’s sugar industry in the colonial period and the main disembarkation point for slaves brought from Africa. This small town, whose villagers work mainly in the surrounding cotton, sugar and asparagus fields, has produced an inordinate number of Peru’s soccer stars and musicians. Peruvians come from around the country to experience the dance and music of El Carmen’s religious festivals.

The recent earthquake devastated El Carmen’s homes, historic plantations and colonial chapels and has hampered critical public services such as education and health care. Residents face serious questions about how to rebuild their community and preserve its unique heritage.

In the El Carmen program we build new homes, clinics and schools, and understand the related septic, plumbing and other systems. We learn from maestros about ways to improve adobe and other local building techniques, and work on programs for earthquake preparedness. We also educate and work with local school children.

During the program, we discuss natural disaster prevention and mitigation efforts around the globe but focus on hands-on earthquake reconstruction in El Carmen. We learn from El Carmen’s courageous leaders and understand their strategies for coping with disaster. As part of this discussion, we explore our own personal style and vision as a leader.

We also experience El Carmen’s unique way of life. The Ballumbrosio family, which helped put Afro-Peruvian music on the world map, invites us into their home for a series of music-and-dance workshops. There we practice El Carmen’s zapateo, or tap dancing tradition, and learn how to use a series of percussive instruments including the cajón, a box that is sat upon and drummed with the hands. There is much to experience in El Carmen: afternoon soccer games with local children, work in the fields and crafts such as basket weaving.

There is also a lot to explore on Peru’s Southern Coast. The enigmatic Nasca Lines are close to El Carmen, as are the bio-rich beaches of the Paracas Marine Reserve, the vineyards of Ica and a host of ancient ruins such as Tambo de Mora. At the end of the trip, we receive a much-deserved break to relax in Peru’s Ica desert, hunt for fossils and sand board on giant dunes before heading home.

Ollantaytambo – Cultural Preservation and Globalization

Ollantaytambo is located in the Sacred Valley of the Incas, halfway between Cusco and Machu Picchu. It is the best-preserved Inca village in Peru, with its narrow alleys, street water canals, and trapezoidal doorways. The Inca temple and fortress above town is second in beauty only to Machu Picchu. In the terraced fields entering town, farmers still use foot plows, or chaquitacllas, to till fields and plant potatoes.

Tourism has brought Ollantaytambo great economic rewards and just as many challenges. While the majority of villagers continue to work as farmers, the economic tide is shifting to tourism as thousands of tourists flow through Ollantaytambo each week on their way to Machu Picchu. Many Ollantaytambo residents struggle to make a living from tourism and others wonder whether all the change is ultimately good for the town’s traditional values, architecture and surrounding environment. As Peru’s best-known example of an Inca village, Ollantaytambo is facing the hardest questions of globalization.

In the Ollantaytambo program, Students work with Peruvian students of their same age to understand the interactions between globalization and cultural preservation and work towards possible long-term solutions. It will be these local students who either carry their communities’ traditions into the future or allow them to disappear forever.

During the program, we discuss other examples of native cultures threatened by globalization but focus on the Quechua-speaking people of Peru. We study Ollantaytambo’s exemplary leaders and learn about the ronda campesina, a centuries-old form of governance used by Quechua-speaking communities across Peru. In the process, we embark on our own path of leadership self-discovery.

Along the way, we explore the majestic scenery of the Sacred Valley. We hike past the salt mines of Maras, visit the world-famous Pisac Market and camp amidst the gorgeous scenery of snow-covered Andes. We hike part of the Inca Trail and rise before dawn to witness sunrise over the carved citadel of Machu Picchu. We spend time learning how to weave, work the fields, and make bread.

Puerto Maldonado – Climate Change and Ecosystem Preservation

More than two-thirds of Peru is covered jungle, and there are few places where the Amazon basin is as accessible and biologically diverse as it is in Peru’s Puerto Maldonado area. In as little as an hour or two after boarding a flight from Cusco or Lima, you can be boating down a chocolate-brown river with the jungle rising on both sides like a canyon of green. Peru’s Amazon hosts the world’s greatest biodiversity – 1,800 species of birds, thousands of types of trees, millions of (mostly undocumented) insects and rare, endangered mega-fauna like the black caiman, giant otter and harpy eagle. Humans have been part of the Amazon’s web of life for at least a thousand years, and pockets of isolated, “no contact” groups continue to live in remote areas of Peru’s Amazon.

Sadly, the Amazon is under siege from oil and natural gas extraction, illegal logging, the bush meat trade and rapidly encroaching colonists who rely on “slash and burn” agriculture for survival. These forces are causing rapid deforestation and species loss in the Amazon, which is already suffering changes caused by climate change. The World Wildlife Foundation estimates that rising temperatures and decreased rainfall caused by climate change could convert large sections of the Amazon into a type of dry savannah. This “drying out” of the Amazon not only accelerates species extinction but it also limits the rain forest’s ability to absorb carbon dioxide produced by the burning of fossil fuels -- thereby quickening the cycle of global climate change.

In the Puerto Maldonado program, we live and study with ecologists from the Inkaterra Association, a non-profit organization devoted to the conservation of Peru’s Amazon. We study rainfall patterns, temperatures and impacts on particular species such as frogs and other amphibians. We contribute to ecological initiatives, such as the construction of education trails, cultivation of medicinal plants, animal counts and other types of work aimed at preserving threatened species. We also work with a nearby community of Ese’Eja indigenous people who are exploring sustainable rain forest industries. We work with these amazing people to harvest seeds and seedlings in forest, tend to communal greenhouses and maintain bee hives.

During the program, we study climate change around the world and focus on specific impacts and mitigation efforts in the Amazon basin. We learn from local ecologists and community elders about what they see every day and how they have learned to grapple with a problem as large and complex as climate change. As we work with these leaders, we begin the process of developing our own leadership style and vision.

During the program, we take ample time to explore the rain forest. We camp overnight in the rain forest to experience an oxbow lake, with all of its animals, as the jungle awakes at dawn. From a hidden blind in the middle of the night, we can observe animals like tapir and brocket deer at a salt lick. We climb tree houses and walk along canopy walkways to explore the treetops of the rain forest. We hike through the rain forest, bird watch and go fishing for red-bellied piraña.

Note: since most flights into the Puerto Maldonado area stop first in Cusco, an extension to Cusco, the Sacred Valley and Machu Picchu can easily be incorporated into the program.

Requirements

We require that students have a satisfactory level of physical fitness in order to participate in manual labor and other physical activities of the program.

Students are also required to fill out a detailed application and medical questionnaire prior to being accepted.

Students should remain flexible to changing circumstances, delays and other hurdles that are common in Peru. The specifics of volunteer work will be decided according to the needs of the community or organization shortly before the group’s in-country arrival.

An intermediate level of Spanish or above is required for the El Carmen and Ollantaytambo programs. There is no language requirement for the Puerto Maldonado program.