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From the Field “Opening our eyes” -Community seed banks at the heart of Peru’s Agrobiodiversity Zones

by Ronnie Vernooy, Marleni Ramirez

Research, conservation, and development organizations in Peru join forces to establish community seed banks and strengthen the conservation and sustainable management of crop diversity in the country’s Agrobiodiversity Zones.

Andenes de Cuyocuyo, a zone bordering Peru’s lowland Amazon region and located 200 km north of Lake Titicaca, in the department of Puno, Peru. Its the first, out of 10, officially recognized Agrobiodiversity Zones (ABDZs). In this zone, farmers conserve 243 potato varieties, 33 of maize and 129 of indigenous tubers (Oca [Oxalis tuberosa], Mashua [Tropaeolum tuberosum] and Olluco [Ullucus tuberosus]). Here, one can find the remnants of  the widely extended agricultural terraces (andenes in Spanish) built by the Incas.

These impressive stone terraces, painstakingly carved out on the steep Andean Mountain slopes, are still used nowadays, but no longer to their full potential: the mid- to high altitude terraces are abandoned. The number of farming households is on the decline and the remaining households do not have enough labor to use all the terrace space. 
 

What are Agrobiodiversity Zones? 

These zones are landscapes where smallholder farmers and indigenous communities engage voluntarily to conserve agrobiodiversity and their related practices. The Ministry of Agricultural Development and Irrigation (MIDAGRI), through its National Institute of Agrarian Innovation (INIA), oversees the designation process and is tasked with their monitoring. These zones, so far cover a total area of 222,000 ha.

Each of the ABDZs represents an area of particular agrobiodiversity, culture, and ecology. The indigenous communities living and working in the ABDZs are the custodians of this agrobiodiversity. According to MIDAGRI, the designation as ABDZ comes with the provision of technical assistance, incentives for the conservation and sustainable use of agrobiodiversity, the promotion of agrotourism, and recognition for the delivery of and recognition for the delivery of other goods and services.

Inca terraces (andenes) in Cuyocuyo, Peru

Potato harvest in Cuyocuyo

In order to supportthe goals of ABDZs, we recently visited the country, supported by the Agrobiodiversity Index initiative, trying to find answers to key questions:

  • How do local communities nowadays manage their indigenous crops in the ABDZs?
  • What challenges do they face?
  • What is the status of agrobiodiversity in the ABDZs?
  • What roles can community seed banks play in the ABDZs?
  • What opportunities are there to turn the ABDZs into attractive and vibrant institutions?

Before traveling to Cuyocuyo, we facilitated a training workshop at the National Institute of Agrarian Innovation (INIA) in Lima on community seed banks for local and national INIA staff, the Ministry of the Environment (MINAM), the International Potato Centre (CIP), and staff of other organizations with an interest in the topic. INIA envisions to establish one or more of these seed banks in each of the ADBZs as key organizations for the conservation and sustainable management of local agrobiodiversity. The training, based on the methodology developed by the Alliance of Bioversity International and CIAT, served as the foundation of this strategy. The training covered organizational, policy/legal, and technical aspects of community seed bank implementation and monitoring.

Once in Cuyocuyo, we interacted with local farmer leaders involved in the management of the ABDZ and carried out a rapid crop diversity assessment in the community of Huancasayani (at 3,800 masl), one of the six communities located in the ABDZ (each community has its own governance structure, and each community is part of the ABDZ management committee). We then facilitated a training workshop on the practical management of community seed banks for 25 farmers of the six communities of the ABDZ, local staff of INIA, and the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) of Peru.

The training focused on the organizational and technical aspects of seed conservation, including the use of airtight containers, desiccants (silica gel, zeolite beads), natural repellents, scales, and seed management registry books.

With WCS support, two potato seed banks have been established in the ABDZ, in the communities of Punalaqueque and Huancasayani, which will start operations after the coming potato harvest (April-May).

Huancayasi potato seed bank topview

Huancayasi potato seed bank

Rapid agrobiodiversity status assessment and prioritization for community seed bank planning

At the premises of the local potato seed bank in the community of Huancasayani, we carried out a six-cell crop diversity analysis with a small group of seed bank members (four women, three men) to find out the current status of crop diversity in the community. Six-cell analysis aims to identify which crop and crop varieties are relatively abundant and which ones are scarce and at risk of disappearing from a community. It is one of the tools to assess the feasibility of establishing a community seed bank in a particular area. Through a community seed bank, farmers can broaden the crop and varietal diversity available via the rescuing of local materials, collaboration with the national genebank, international genebanks, plant breeding programs, and other community seed banks.

The results of the analysis, presented in the table below, show that several crops, grown by only a few households on a small piece of land, are under pressure and farmers agreed that there is an urgent need to recover lost seed stocks of two crops of high interest, maize and Andean lupin. Farmers pointed out that mauka had disappeared from the area, but that they are more interested in bringing other crops to the community, notably quinoa, tumbo, nabo, and mountain papaya (papayuela).

Table: Six-cell analysis of crop diversity in Huancasayani 

Many households, large area
-Potato 
 		 Many households, small area
-Oca (Oxalis tuberosa)
-Ollucus  
-Faba bean		 Lost crops
-Mauka (Mirabilis expansa)
 
Few households, large area   
-		 Few households, small area  
-Mashua/Izaño (Tropaeolum tuberosum)
-Aguaymanto (2 types) (Physalis peruviana)
-Yacón (Smallanthus sonchifolius)
-Maize*
-Andean lupin*		 Desired crops
-Quinoa
-Tumbo (Genus Passiflora)
-Nabo (Genus Brassica)
-Mountain papaya (papayuela)

* There is a need to recover the lost seed stock of those crops

Concerning the supply of local seed varieties, farmers commented that by far and large they self-save seeds, sometimes complemented by the purchase of small quantities of seeds (for example, in the neighboring community of Ñacoreque), and through exchange with other farmers. They mentioned that seed stocks in general are small. They expressed satisfaction with the new potato seed bank, which provisionally stores nine varieties of potato at the moment, which were harvested from a small field adjacent to the facility.

The crop most discussed in the meeting though was Andean lupin, a highly nutritious crop from which milk can be extracted. The group liked the suggestion that we made to design a participatory variety selection experiment to analyse the performance and taste of multiple varieties, among which the best performing one(s) could be selected for conservation in the seed bank, for multiplication and distribution, and processing into a value added product, such as milk.

The roles of community seed banks

Community seed banks, tried but not common in Peru, have demonstrated their usefulness around the world. They can have multiple functions: conservation, repatriation of “lost” varieties, variety selection, introduction of new crop species and varietal diversity, seed multiplication, exchange and distribution, value addition, credit provision, education and training, organization of food and seed fairs, and promotion of healthy and nutritious crops.

During the training workshops, participants learned and shared knowledge about community seed banks that effectively fulfill these functions. In Guatemala, community seed banks “rescued” several local bean and maize varieties at risk of disappearing through a Payment for the Conservation of Agrobiodiversity Services initiative. In Kenya, community seed banks have started to generate income through the manufacturing and sales of composite flours made of neglected crops (amaranth, cassava, millets, sorghum). In China, community seed banks take on the lead role in the conservation efforts in Globally Important Agricultural Heritage Sites.

In Lima and Cuyocuyo, training participants endorsed the key roles envisioned for community seed banks in the overall management of the ABDZs. They put forward concrete actions to achieve this. For 2025, at the level of the two community (potato) seed banks, they proposed to: i) develop an annual work plan; ii) define rules and regulations for community seed bank operations; iii) collect a large amount of seeds; iv) request technical support to strengthen seed bank operations; v) enlarge the management committee; vi) engage strongly with local authorities and communities to raise awareness about the roles of community seed banks and generate more interest, and vii) visit and organize seed fairs.

A very first step agreed upon was to explore the physical expansion of the two potato seed banks to include other crops as well. At the level of the ABDZ, they proposed to create a coordination mechanism between the Management Committee of the ABDZ and the community seed banks; establish more community seed banks; provide support to and disseminate news about the community seed banks. Capturing these important resolutions, Valeriano Mamani, a member of Andenes de Cuyocuyo Management Committee remarked, “Little by little, we are opening our eyes.”

The first steps have been taken on the road to making the ABDZs dynamic, locally led and results focused institutions, but much remains to be done to establish multifunctional community seed banks in all of Peru’s agrobiodiversity zones. Farmers, INIA, MINAM, WCS, the Alliance, and other partners will continue working together to make this happen.

Acknowledgements 
We thank the farmers in Cuyocuyo and colleagues of INIA and WCS for their guidance and support during our visit. Photos: Bioversity International/R.Vernooy. Story edited by José Luis Urrea-Benítez, Science Communications Specialist.

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