Conservation, restoration and sustainable management of dry forest in Southern Peru

"The Huarango Project"

The project began in 2005, helping the local community in Ica to establish a tree nursery and planting programme, a challenging conservation plan and a spring 'Huarango Festival'. Between 2006 and 2009, with support from the Darwin Initiative (Defra, UK), the project worked to develop ways to restore and manage native vegetation, building educational and cultural engagement with local people. Today the project focuses on restoration and conservation of useful native species such as the multi-purpose Huarango tree and its associated flora and fauna. The team in Ica puts sustainable agriculture at the heart of this long-term community and ecosystem survival project, helping people and biodiversity to adapt and thrive.

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Partners

The Huarango Project brought together partners with a wide range of skills and experience to combine local knowledge and interdisciplinary science with an ecosystem approach. This provided a strong basis for local people to take ownership of the project, which today is run by local people who have always lived and worked in Ica.

The project initially partnered national universities (Universidad La Molina, Lima and Universidad San Luis Gonzaga de Ica) and non-governmental organisations including Grupo de Aves Peru Ica (GAP Ica), which undertook biodiversity and conservation studies, and Asociación para la Niñez y su Ambiente (ANIA), which participated in the schools engagement programme. From Chile a colloboration between Instituto de Investigaciones Agropecuarias (INIA) and Kew's Millennium Seed Bank partnership (MSBP) provided technical support for seed collection and propagation activities. Trees for Cities (UK) began supporting the tree planting and took on the funding of native tree planting and restoration.