Condors

Heifer International

Alejandro Musalem
Mexico Country Director
Mr. Musalem directs Heifer International's Mexico country program. Trained as an agronomist, Mr. Musalem has been Heifer's Country Director for the past three years. Mr. Musalem attended the Second Native Food Summit held in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in September 2004. From that meeting he identified aquaculture as a potential future Heifer project activity. The exchange provided Mr. Musalem an opportunity to undertake a closer examination of potential Heifer sites, projects and activities.

Heifer International
Press CDA 23 PTE. 1508-5
Puebla, PUE. 72410 MEXICO
222-211-2042 / 222-211-2047
e-mail: alejandro.musalem@heifer.org

Dr. Wilfredo Contreres Sanchez
In-Country Project Leader
Dr. Contreras acted as the in-country coordinator and planner for the Oregon State ACRSP Exchange. Currently he directs the Biological Sciences Division at the Universidad Juarez Autonoma de Tabasco . Dr. Contreras also runs the aquaculture research and outreach efforts at the university.

Aquaculture Laboratory
Division of Biological Sciences
Universidad Juarez Autonoma de Tabasco
Carretera Vhsa-Cardenas Km 0.5
Entronque a Bosques de Saloya
Villahermosa, Tabasco, CP 86000, Mexico
PH: 993-358-1579; 993-358-1500 ext. 6401
e-mail: conterw@hotmail.com

Universidad Juarez Autonoma de Tabasco

Mr. Uliss Hernandez Vidal

Mr. Vidal was responsible for our daily activities and accommodations throughout the trip. He is a professor of Biology at the Universidad Juarez Autonoma de Tabasco.

Division of Biological Sciences
Universidad Juarez Autonoma de Tabasco
Carretera Vhsa-Cardenas Km 0.5
Entronque a Bosques de Saloya
Villahermosa, Tabasco, CP 86000, Mexico
PH: 52(993) 161-4591
e-mail: uliseshv44@hotmail.com

Feliciano Lazaro and Melesio Perez

Both Mr. Lazaro and Mr. Perez are Camellones Chontales who live in Tucta , an area within Nacajuca. Both are members of a 20 member farmer group that works a large lagoon-dyke system on the outskirts of the village. This area is estimated at 150 hectares with 75 hectares of lagoons. The group is also behind a development of a restaurant at the site.

Victor Manuel Jermanez Velazquez and Ricardo Valascez

Both Mr. Velazquez and Mr. Valascez reside in Rancheria Boca Chilapa/ Centla . This Chontales river community exists in a line system with households located on the banks of the Rio Grojalva approximately 60 kilometers upstream from the Gulf of Mexico. This community ran a two year old cooperative based fish hatchery for stocking of local ponds and net pens. Two species were produced gar and native Cichlids. From all of the Eagle impressions, Boca Chilapa was a solid running egalitarian community with strong leadership and full participation from other community members. In some respects it could be seen as a model community that is successfully adopting aquaculture to create more employment and food.

Thomas Jermanez and Pepe May Cano

Mr. Jermanez and Mr. Cano live in Buena Vista a Chantelles community situated on the shore of Santa Anita Lake. The villagers make their living by fishing and agriculture. In particular these two participants are part of a a 20 family member cooperative that is seeking to build a fish hatchery on the shores of Santa Anita Lake.

Birolio May
Mr. May was the senior person on this trip and resides in the Chontalles community of Simon Sarlat. He discussed a failed effort to raise tilapia and a small group of farmers who were seeking to build a large roadside pond a few kilometers outside the village on the road to Buena Vista.

Mr. Fred Chu
In-Country Project Leader
Fred Chu is a senior IIAP researcher. Mr. Chu is also a doctoral candidate in Biology/ Aquaculture at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale, Illinois. Mr. Chu acted as the in-country Oregon State ACRSP Exchange Coordinator and Planner for the exchange.

Programa de Ecosistemas Acuáticos
Instituto de Investigaciones de la Amazonía
Peruana-IIAP
Km 4.5 Carretera Iquitos-Nauta, Iquitos, Peru.
Telefax: (065) 21-0006
Celular: (065) 967-3457
e-mail: fchuk20@yahoo.com

Juan Chavez Muñoz
Juan Chavez Muñoz, a Shipibo elder, from the village of Camaria is regional and technical coordinator for the Association for Integrated Research and Rural Development (AIDER), a Peruvian non-profit organization based in Pucallpa. Mr. Munoz assists in framing and communicating the developmental goals and objectives of the Shipibo people. These activities are designed to strengthen traditional communal organization. Mr. Munoz organizes nonformal educational activities in Shipibo villages so that villagers can overcome the long history of paternalism and establish sovereignty over their traditional territories. As an AIDER field coordinator, Mr. Munoz works to prepare village leaders to play an integral role in community development and extends this vision and training to village youth groups. Through these efforts the Shipibo hope to manage their own development without outside influence. His presentation focused on projects and the progress made to attain these goals. More on AIDER...

e-mail: iskonpe@yahoo.com

Thomas Chavez
Thomas Chavez, Shipibo, from the village of Calleria is one of the principal members of his village who works in the area communal forest management. His training and involvement includes working with members of not only his home village of Calleria, butalso Preferida Charashmana, Puerto Belen, Curiaa, and Caimaria. His presentation outlined the benefits from this collaboration which includes opening up new markets, sharing profits and enhancing personal pride. He emphasized that the women of the communities were also are involved in community managment of the forests. These activities allow village-based organizations some control over traditional resources that are threatened by illegal cutting by outside interests.

e-mail: yaka_same@hotmail.com

Santiago Nunta Cauper
Santiago Nunta Cauper is Shipibo and his village is located up the Calleria river, a 7- hour trip in traditional canoes from Pucallpa. There are 65 families living in this village. They support themselves by harvesting the Aguaje fruit, as well as fishing and hunting. Mr. Cauper’s presentation explained the process of harvesting the fruit from the Aguaje tree and training in how to harvest the fruit without harming trees or the forest around these trees. Mr. Cauper explained that in the past trees were often cut down by outsiders in order to get to the fruit. He identified that there are approximately 520 trees on 93 hectares of land, located about 2 hours from the village upriver in the “White Gorge.” Villagers harvest the fruit on a rotating basis. The men have been trained to harvest by AIDER staff without harming the trees. Other members of this village based communal organization then prepare the fruit for transport back to the village and then on to the markets in Pucallpa. Once the fruits are sold they distribute the money between the workers and the village.

e-mail: shantinunta@yahoo.com

Rafael Lomas
Rafael Lomas is Shipibo from the village of Calleria. Mr. Lomas assists with the marketing of Shipibo women’s crafts. Mr. Lomas explained that the village women do all the work associated with gathering the materials, creating the pieces, and selling through the village cooperative. The cooperative markets these items to tourists and for export. The cooperative is also learning how to manage the forest resources, such as the trees that dye is derived from, so that they will be available for years to come. Shipibo crafts have been featured in Peruvian newspapers, magazines and on numerous Internet websites, some produced by the cooperative. This is one way that the Shipibo people are working to assert autonomy over their products leading to economic prosperity and cooperation through community based organization and management practices.

e-mail: shabuampico@hotmail.com

Dr. Otto Flores
Dr. Flores is a director of the National Intercultural University of the Amazon who was invited to the conference in order to introduce the university’s creation and future contribution to the Indigenous people of Peru in the coming years. The Eagles also visited the campus to view the projects in agriculture and heard presentations from different departments.

Humberto Sampayo Vasquez
Humberto Sampayo Vasquez, is regional director of the Indigenous Regional Organization of Masisea, ARDIM, which is an organization to bring together Indigenous groups across Peru. Their main objectives are working with the government of Peru in free trade issues and protecting the economic and environmental interests of Indigenous people. Mr. Vasquez emphasized the importance of representation and future protection of Indigenous rights as the government expands its interests in trade with developed countries such as the United States.

Mariano Rebza Alfaro
Mariano Rebza Alfaro is an aquaculture specialist who briefed the Eagles on the paiche cage demonstration project at Caimito. Mr. Alfaro provided an overview of the status of wild paiche and the partial results of the cage culture project.

Instituto de Investigaciones de La Amazonia Peruana
C.F.B. Km. 12.400 (Estacion Experimental)
Cel:9618792
Pucallpa, peru
e-mail: iiapuc@iiap.org.pe

Condors - Mexico

Condors - Peru

Oregon State University's USAID-supported Aquaculture Collaborative Research Support Program (ACRSP), through the Indian Nations Initiative of Heifer International and the Indigenous Environmental Network's Sustainable Communities Project funded the “Eagle of the North and Condor of the South Aquaculture Exchange Projects. These projects consisted of two groups of American Indian fish-cultural practitioners (“Eagles”) to exchange and share information with Indigenous South and North American counterparts (“Condors”), in Peru and Mexico respectively. Heifer International supported the North American component while ACRSP supported in-country activities for Eagles and Condors. Subsequently, Heifer International (through the Indian Nations Initiative) sub-contracted the Bemidji, Minnesota based Indigenous Environmental Network (IEN) to arrange all logistics of Eagle travel. The first exchange took place when an Eagle delegation spent April 22-28, 2006 in the Pucallpa region of Peru and in Mexico March 7-14, 2007.

Project leaders from Oregon State Univeristy ACRSP and the Indigenous Envrionmental Network (both traveling and non-traveling) contributed a great deal of time and effort to ensure that both exchanges met the project objectives. In-country Project Leaders are identified and listed with the delegates in their respective countries. The non-traveling Project Leaders:

Aquaculture CRSP
Dr. Hillary Egna
Hillary Egna is Director of the ACRSP and senior research faculty for the College of Agricultural Sciences at Oregon State University . Dr. Egna is one of two main originators of this exchange project, along with Kathy Knott, formerly of Heifer International. Dr. Egna has over 25 years of experience in international research and development, and has worked in 19 countries. Hillary first became involved in international aquaculture in 1982 while working in Central America. Her academic background is in resource geography, natural resources, fisheries and aquaculture. Professionally, Hillary has been engaged in projects that focus on poverty reduction and means to improve people’s livelihoods through the careful use of water resources.

418 Snell Hall
Oregon State University
Corvallis, Oregon 97331-6427
PH: 541-737-6427
e-mail: egnah@onid.orst.edu
PH: 541-737-6427

Dr. James Bowman
Jim Bowman is senior research faculty in the Department of Fisheries and Wildlife at Oregon State University . Dr. Bowman has taught courses in aquaculture and group problem solving and has worked with OSU extension faculty to develop pond management workshops for private pond owners. Dr. Bowman has been involved in aquaculture since joining International Voluntary Services as a Fisheries Extension Worker in Laos in 1969. Jim completed his MS in aquaculture at Auburn University (1980) and a PhD at OSU in 1990. As Outreach Coordinator he has helped coordinate logistics for this innovative information exchange project.
418 Snell Hall
Oregon State University
Corvallis, Oregon 97331-6427
PH: 541-737-6427
e-mail: James.Bowman@orgegonstate.edu

Indigenous Environmental Network
Tom Goldtooth
Tom Goldtooth, Dine’/Dakota, is the executive director of the Bemidji, Minnesota based Indigenous Environmental Network. For the past twenty years he has been involved at the international level on a number of Indigenous treaty, environmental and cultural survival issues. The IEN acted as a coordinating entity sub-contracted by Heifer International to plan, arrange logistics and execute the Eagles trip to Peru and Mexico.

PO Box 485
Bemidji, MN 56619
PH: 218-751-4967
e-mail: ien@igc.org

The list below is information for the Condor Delegates. Also includes email and relavant web links when available. For "Condor" contacts see: Eagles.

Strengthening food security, health and community development in a way that reflects Indigenous Sovereignty and Standards as related to the Water World and its interlinked natural resources through education, empowerment and capacity building by Indigenous Peoples .

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EAGLE - CONDOR AQUACULTURE EXCHANGE PROJECT

CONDOR DELEGATES and PROJECT LEADERS