About us and our objectives We are a group of investigators with prolongued experience working on economic development projects in Peru. This Andean country has a very difficult geography, not only due to its imposing mountains, but also to its very dense rainforest, that covers roughly one-half of its territory. Our trips through the various and very different regions in Perú has given us a deep appreciation of the beauty and potential of this country for development. This, together with the political demands for decentralization, and the increasing awareness of the importance of preserving the environment lead us to look for alternatives of development based on deepening the knowledge of the geography that in Peru shows an extraordinary complexity. This is a very great challenge that requires very serious multidisciplinary studies. The inspiration to decentralize the country through a plan called "Peruvía" is owed to Alfonso Rizo-Patron, who during his governmental tenure as Secretary of Development and Public Works between 1959 and 1960 hired prestigious foreign consulting companies to make studies on the central region of Peru and its possibilities of development. One of these companies was Hunting Associates of Canada, that with radar technologies made the first correct mapping surveys of the Mantaro river in its confluence with the Apurímac River, and of the Cutivireni river basin. In 1961, while studying aerial photos of the zone by stereographic pairs, Mr. Rizo-Patron discovered the largest known natural bridge in the world over the Cutivireni river, that is one of the most extraordinary natural features of the country, which is little known until now. One of the economic activities considered in the Peruvia Plan, and that offers much hope for the future of Peru, is Tourism. This activity is already important mainly in the region of Cuzco, that is called the archaeological capital of South America due to its marvelous remains of a culture that developed gradually in the Andean region adapting itself in a very admirable way to the extraordinary difficulties posed by the topography. However, there are many more attractive territories in Peru, both from the point of view of archaeology as well as of their natural beauty that have not been tapped, uncovered, or even discovered. One of our immediate objectives is to use the new technologies in the field of computerized geography for identifying and making these regions known to the world through the Internet. For this purpose we have organized ten aerial and/or land expeditions to previously unexplored or little known territories since the year 2000. Many of the highlights of these expeditions are reported in this website through hundreds of images and some videos.
A longer term objective of our group is to develop new criteria for the economic
development of tourism, in a country that suffer a series of problems that
inhibit investment in this field. One of the main reasons that Tourism has not been developed in Peru is that adequate infrastructure has not been
built for this
purpose. The existing roads in many mountain places are very dangerous, and
furthermore, many important archaeological sites are only accessible by long
walks, such as the important sites in the Yauyos Province, and
many others. In the case of the Amazonian rainforest, the obstacles are of a different
nature, but here the problem is compounded by the fact that the construction of roads has a very harmful impact on the delicate environment of this region of extraordinary
biodiversity. Another field that offers great promise for economic development is related to the great biodiversity that is found in this country. Although the exploitation of this natural resource requires much care due to the need to maintain the delicate environmental equilibria, there are many products that can be very profitable. Medicinal herbs, many types of fruits and nutritive plants, hundreds of species of wood, have to be studied thoroughly in order to find the ways to make them available in the world markets economically and sustainably. Some information on these possibilities can be found in http://www.peruvillage.com/store/biodiversity.html and other similar websites. But all of this requires a concerted effort to develop. Only if this is worked out by people of good will and much imagination, in an international cooperation scheme, will we be able to cope with the challenges that are present in a world of increasing social unrest due to the inefficient allocation of resources and distribution of wealth. Finally,
there is an extremely grave social problem in Perú. In the case of the mountainous
rainforest this is closely related to the interdependent problem of deforestation, narcotraffic
and terrorism that is destroying the ancestral territories of the main ethnic
groups that have originally inhabited these lands. This destruction not only has
negative ecological consequences but it endangers the preservation of the ancestral knowledge of these ethnic groups who have adapted
admirably to the complex rainforest environment. |