The Peruvian Government’s attempts to bring Andean farmers into the global economy have been disastrous. Free market, neo-liberal policies and modern farming technology not only expose farmers to financial risk but also lead to ecological degradation. In response, Andean farmers have taken up the ancient practice of bartering food products.

The Andes support a rich variety of agricultural biodiversity, but growing conditions are difficult and require careful management. Since the 1950s, Peruvian farmers have been threatened by state policies encouraging them to supply urban markets, often through the production of cash crops. Predictably, this has exposed farmers to market costs and risks, and damaged the fragile mountain environments that they depend on.

A report from the International Institute for Environment and Development, UK, argues that the recent increase in food barter markets in the Andes represents a practical response from farming communities. For example, in the Lares Valley, Peru, there is a network of barter markets called ‘chalayplasa’. This has its origins in markets that trade coca for food products.

It is mostly women from three different agroecological zones , separated by altitude, who gather at these markets to exchange food products. Highland Puna farmers trade medicinal plants, meat and wool with Quechua farmers (grains and medicinal plants) and Lowland Yunga farmers (coca, coffee and yucca).

Andean barter markets are important because they:

• give some of the poorest social groups in the Andes better food security and nutrition
• conserve agricultural biodiversity through the growing and exchange of a variety of native crops: there are 53 maize varieties and 247 potato varieties being grown in the Lares region
• allow farmers to maintain their complex traditional land practices in different agro-ecological zones, enhancing soil fertility and making use of natural pest control and pollination processes
• allow independent local control of production and consumption, particularly by women.

About 4,000 people from 31 communities from the middle and upper Lares valley use the chalayplasa. The high rate of participation is attributable to the principles governing such a social system:

• There is no minimum amount of food required to participate in the chalayplasa; any amount can be exchanged.
• Exchanges are not based on the visual quality of products, as in commercial markets. The principal criterion is flavour, which the native varieties on offer provide.
• Exchanges are based on fairness and need, and support those whose productive capacity is lower, such as widows and older people, who may have fewer, less attractive products.

The barter markets in the Lares Valley are a way for locals to obtain a variety of food products independently of commercial markets, which do not always cater for the needs of their households. They therefore represent valid responses by Andean farmers to the loss of control caused by government policies.

Source(s):
‘Barter markets: sustaining people and nature in the Andes’, Sustaining local food systems, agricultural biodiversity and livelihoods, by Michel Pimbert, IIED: London, 2005 (PDF) Full document.

id21 Research Highlight: 3 November 2006

Further Information:
Michel Pimbert
Sustainable Agriculture, Biodiversity and Livelihoods Programme
International Institute for Environment and Development
3 Endsleigh Street
London, WC1H 0DD
UK

Tel: +44 (0)20 7388 2117
Fax: +44 (0)20 7388 2826
Contact the contributor: michel.pimbert@iied.org

International Institute for Environment and Development, UK

Other related links:
'From seed to plate: valuing local food systems'

'Balancing indigenous crops and market demands in the Andes'