Saasa, in the Ucayali department of eastern Peru, is located at the headwaters of the Utuquin\u00eda River, a tributary of the larger Ucayali. Inhabited by just 80 people of the Awaj\u00fan ethnic group, it is the closest Indigenous community to the national park.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Responding to alerts and geo-referenced information obtained through real-time forest monitoring platform Global Forest Watch<\/a>, Sa\u00fal sailed down the Utuquin\u00eda River twelve hours from his village and walked through a long stretch of thick forest to reach the area of the alert around Saasa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI dodged dangerous terrain until I was in a place where I could launch a drone,\u201d he recalls, noting that the deforestation alert \u2013 and coca plantations \u2013 were on the border of Saasa and a hamlet named Siete de Julio, as well as in other neighbouring non-Indigenous settlements.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The chief of Saasa, Iv\u00e1n Agkuash, tells Dialogue Earth that coca \u2013 the plant whose leaves are used to make cocaine \u2013 is being planted in the area. He estimates that more than 10 hectares of primary forest have been razed and replaced by coca fields close to the community\u2019s territory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe coca plantations have not yet reached the community, but we are vigilant,\u201d adds Agkuash, who says he is concerned about the vulnerability of the buffer zone for conservation that is demarcated around the Sierra del Divisor park. Saasa has become a transit point for drug trafficking, but the community has so far chosen to avoid confrontation, the Indigenous leader says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n As Sa\u00fal observed during his visits into this troubled part of the Amazon, the route of the mochileros<\/em>, or \u201cbackpackers\u201d \u2013 people who transport drugs for criminal organisations in Brazil \u2013 begins in various Brazilian border towns and continues on to the headwaters of the Abujao River in Ucayali. It then traverses the villages of Aguas Negras and Mazaray, in the Abujao River basin, before crossing part of the Sierra del Divisor National Park and exiting at the Utuquin\u00eda River.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThey pass Saasa through the Utuquin\u00eda River, even shooting into the air [to intimidate residents], and in this way they reach Siete de Julio and the other neighbouring non-Indigenous hamlets,\u201d Sa\u00fal explains. They follow the same route back to Brazil after collecting drug packages, he adds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A similar situation has been observed in the Indigenous community of San Mateo, also in the buffer zone of Sierra del Divisor. According to forest monitors from the international NGO Global Conservation<\/a>, which works to protect endangered wilderness areas like the national park, much of the depredation and coca cultivation in San Mateo extends along the banks of the Abujao River. Because of the risk, the monitors, who have asked to remain anonymous for their safety, tell Dialogue Earth that they have not been able to establish how much deforestation there has been in the area, but estimate it is no less than 50 hectares. The latest report<\/a> published in June by Peru\u2019s National Commission for Development and Life without Drugs (Devida), the agency that leads the fight against drugs, states that of the 92,784 hectares of coca that were detected in the country in 2023, 351 hectares are in the park\u2019s buffer zone. While the report indicates that no coca cultivation has been recorded within the protected area, there is pressure in the adjacent areas of the buffer zone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In 2023, Ucayali saw 27,340 hectares of deforestation, and in the first two months of 2024, forest loss in the department reached 673 hectares, according to the most recent analysis<\/a> by the Regional Forestry and Wildlife Management Unit of Ucayali. Of that, 203 hectares, or just under a third, are within Indigenous communities. This marks a nearly 800% increase compared to the same period in 2023, where only 23 hectares<\/a> of deforestation was recorded in Ucayali\u2019s Indigenous communities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The manager of the regional office, Franz Tang, declared<\/a> during the presentation of the report that one of the causes for the levels of deforestation reported in the department is illicit crops, and that the problem demands an urgent multi-sectoral intervention by the state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Forest monitors from Global Conservation say that the NGO seeks to create a protection belt for the natural area through forest control and surveillance. To do this, they are trying to consolidate and coordinate work with all the surrounding communities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Indigenous communities of Nuevo Saposoa and Patria Nueva were part of a pilot forest<\/a> monitoring project run by the NGO, in which groups of community members serving as eco-guards received training in the use of drones, GPS and analysis of satellite images. The training enabled them to collect statistics to produce reports about the state of their forests and, thus, for their situation to be considered by the authorities. The monitors report that Nuevo Saposoa, for example, reduced deforestation to zero in 2022, after reaching a peak of more than 15,000 hectares of deforestation in 2016.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIn the last three years, we have not had any deforestation alerts [in Nuevo Saposoa] nor in Patria Nueva due to forest monitoring, surveillance by the Indigenous guards and patrolling by the authorities,\u201d says a community eco-guard, who requested anonymity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Despite the inroads made on decreasing deforestation in Ucayali\u2019s villages, in Peru, the care of forests and Indigenous territories remains a dangerous task for which there is no guaranteed protection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In October 2020, the Peruvian Congress rejected<\/a> the ratification of the Escaz\u00fa Agreement, an international treaty that promotes the right to environmental information, justice and decision-making in Latin American and Caribbean countries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The agreement<\/a> also provides for the protection of human rights defenders in environmental matters. This is especially pertinent in Peru, where over 35 Indigenous defenders have been murdered<\/a> for protecting their territories in the last decade, according to the Interethnic Association for the Development of the Peruvian Jungle (Aidesep<\/a>). The updated Aidesep database, seen by Dialogue Earth, shows that nearly a third of the crimes (10) took place in Ucayali.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Miguel Guimaraes, vice-president of Aidesep, says that without the ratified agreement, the voices and proposals of Peruvian Indigenous peoples will always be left in a vacuum in regional environmental forums.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWhen we arrive at decision-making bodies, we are not even considered, and everything goes to the archive,\u201d he tells Dialogue Earth. This was the case at the third Conference of the Parties to the Escaz\u00fa Agreement (COP3)<\/a>, held in Chile in April, where, Guimaraes says, he felt that suggestions to make visible the need for protection of Indigenous defenders were not taken on board. \u201cPeru has not ratified the Escaz\u00fa agreement. This is the reason why we do not have a voice that can carry our demands,\u201d he adds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At the end of COP3, Guimaraes was informed of an attack on his home<\/a>. His belongings were looted<\/a>, and the words \u201cHe will not live\u201d were spray-painted on the surrounding fence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Guimares, an Indigenous leader, says the prosecutor\u2019s investigations into the threat have not progressed. He says he has made long journeys to give his statement to the prosecutor, but that he has yet to receive answers about who was responsible for the attack.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Despite the setbacks that the non-ratification of Escaz\u00fa is said to have brought for Peru\u2019s Indigenous communities, there may still be opportunities for legislative change. Katherine S\u00e1nchez, coordinator of the Biodiversity and Indigenous Peoples Programme of the Peruvian Society of Environmental Law (SPDA), identified the Action Plan on Environmental Defenders<\/a> \u2013 part of article nine of the Escaz\u00fa Agreement that was approved at COP3 \u2013 as a tool to understand how risk prevention and protection measures are progressing in other countries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The plan provides for an exchange of information and outlines how the ratifying countries have dealt with experiences of risky situations affecting defenders, enabling the identification of common standards and generation of an international protection strategy for discussion in future meetings. S\u00e1nchez notes that this will make it possible to attack the structural or root causes of the dangers faced by defenders. <\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cNon-ratifying countries, such as Peru, are invited to learn what those countries that continue with Escaz\u00fa are doing, learn from the processes and participate in the strategy. Afterwards, [all countries] will decide whether to improve its regulations or apply different mechanisms,\u201d she explains.<\/p>\n\n\n\nPassage of drugs<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Another point of attention is in the Guapries Peasant Community, which is made up of three hamlets. In the last patrol that the community\u2019s leader, Laiver V\u00e1squez, carried out with forest guards, he says that he detected at least 15 hectares of coca plantations in an area located just 500 metres from the national park. Since August, the community has logged 14 deforestation alerts. Sa\u00fal says members of the Guapries and Saasa communities will be trained by Global Conservation in the use of technologies to conserve their forests.<\/p>\n\n\n\nFew solutions<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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<\/div>No laws, no protection<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
When we arrive at decision-making bodies, Indigenous peoples are not even considered, and everything goes to the archive<\/blockquote>Miguel Guimaraes, vice-president of Aidesep<\/cite><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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