Sierra del Divisor National Park, Peru Progress Report 2019-2020

In February 2019, Global Conservation launched our Global Park Defense Program in Sierra del Divisor National Park, Peru. Sierra del Divisor is one of the most biodiverse national parks in all of the Amazonas region, and it faces extensive threats.

Sierra del Divisor National Park covers approximately 1.3 million hectares, with over 400,000 adjacent hectares of indigenous reserves and protected areas. This ecosystem is suffering from illegal logging and mining, but it also faces a unique threat: illegal coca growing and trading.

Sierra del Divisor National Park is one of the greatest refuges for biodiversity on Earth, containing thousands of species of wildlife and plants and storing more than 500 million tons of carbon dioxide. This is equivalent to over half of the annual CO2 emissions from cars in the USA.  

The Sierra del Divisor region is home to around 20 indigenous communities and provides food and water for more than 230,000 people. Sierra del Divisor National Park is also a great asset for Peruvian development and will be a major contributor towards Peru's efforts to reduce carbon.

Threats to Sierra del Divisor

Once protected by its remote location, Sierra del Divisor is now besieged by a variety of threats that could destroy it forever. Sierra del Divisor National Park faces imminent threats from wildlife poaching, land clearing for coca production, and illegal logging. Unchecked, these threats could destroy the area in a matter of years. 

Peru faces massive deforestation due to land clearing for coca production and illegal logging, even deep within the national park. Most of the world’s coca is grown in three countries: Colombia, Bolivia, and Peru. In the Sierra del Divisor region, narco-traffickers are cutting roads and trails to reach remote locations to clear forests and plant coca. The chemicals they use to manufacture the coca leaves into paste include kerosene, gasoline, and a host of other extremely toxic chemicals that end up in the waterways and in the soil. 

Land clearing for coca plantations is commonplace now in the buffer zones.

While much progress has been made by establishing the new national park in 2015 and involving the military in sweeps to eradicate large scale coca growing, these pressures continue to take their toll. The Peruvian Amazon as a whole has lost over one million hectares of forest in the past 15 years, and areas already devastated by mining and logging highlight the urgent need for permanent protection of Sierra del Divisor. 

We face some unique challenges but look forward to continuing the implementation of our Global Park Defense strategy. 

Global Conservation signed a cooperation agreement with the regional government of Ucayali and local indigenous communities.

Global Conservation Strategy

Global Conservation is funding the deployment of Global Park Defense in Sierra del Divisor National Park in the Peruvian Amazon. In a historic first, we recently secured approvals and began the first joint patrol operations in Peru to fight against illegal coca plantations and logging. These patrols involve stakeholders from the national park, the marines, nearby communities, and the police, and utilize UAV drones, satellite communications and SMART patrols.

Our strategy is to focus on opening the southern areas of Sierra del Divisor to eco-tourism as an alternative to coca, logging and wildlife poaching. By forging strong alliances within the surrounding communities and with government and law enforcement, we are bringing various stakeholders to the table to focus on conservation, security, and tourism in Sierra del Divisor National Park. 

Global Park Defense deployment in Sierra del Divisor National Park includes:

1. Community-based Protection and Development
2. Coordination with Law Enforcement
3. SMART Patrolling
4. Surveillance and Forest Monitoring
5. Community-based Tourism Development

1.   Community-based Protection and Development

Global Conservation works closely with two indigenous communities in Sierra del Divisor National Park: Patria Nueva and Nuevo Saposoa.

In March 2019, we conducted a threat assessment and an evaluation of the park rangers, bases of operation and patrol practices. We established that an arresting force was necessary in the region. We quickly established foundational partnerships, bringing together numerous government officials including the governors of the states of Ucayali and Laredo, numerous NGO’s, the Navy, Army, Special Police, and the indigenous communities in the area.  

 Community monitors on night watch in the buffer zone of Sierra del Divisor National Park.

Global Conservation is supporting community-based patrolling to enable surrounding villages to protect their own lands and the park from illegal logging and land clearing by coca producers.

The Global Park Defense program is focused on the southern entrances to the national park, including surveillance cameras on rivers and trails in the park, SMART ranger patrols, aerial and UAV drone surveillance, and targeted patrols based on satellite and aerial monitoring to increase the effectiveness of forest and wildlife protection.

Joint community patrols using UAV drones and GPS to document illegal land clearing for coca cultivation near Patria Nueva and Nuevo Sapasoa.

2.   Coordination with Law Enforcement: Community-Led SMART Patrolling with UAV Drone Support

The communities Nuevo Sapasoa and Patria Nueva are involved in all aspects of the program. They are our eyes and ears in the jungle, so we have provided funding for the completion of a strategically-placed lookout post which will be manned 24/7 by both communities.

Communities now, for the first time, have support when invaders come into their lands. They now can control their own destiny against powerful forces stealing from their forests outside the national park.

Community-based patrolling supported by Global Conservation.

We are building another lookout on an alternate river route that goes around Nuevo Sapasoa and is often used by illegal loggers and smugglers to avoid detection. Both check points will also allow us to mount our cameras and microwave sensors. The information gathered by the cameras and sensors can then be relayed to the proper authorities. The communities provide vital intelligence to protection and enforcement agencies, allowing them to protect the Amazon in a safer, more effective manner.

Community members always carry GPS units when on patrol or on watch duty. They have always carried out these duties, but they now have equipment to log all of their observation data and report it directly to the proper authorities. All of their patrolling can now be tracked, and a database has been started to identify high-traffic areas. 

Illegal wood taken from the buffer zone of Sierra del Divisor National Park being transported down the Ucayali River for sale.

Total Kilometers Patrolled by the Communities: 2,815.40

Total Kilometers Patrolled by the Navy: 1,554.20

Total Hectares of Coca Destroyed: 15

Total  Hectares of Illegal Crops Destroyed: 12

Total Kilometers Allotted for New Patrol Routes: 12 (linear)

Total Number of Arrests: 5

Total Contacts with Involving Illegal Activity: 14

We will continue to work with the Peruvian government toward expanding the protected area in the coming months. We hope to secure legal protection for an additional 300,000 hectares in the near future.

After getting all involved parties on the same page, we donated equipment to the Navy, park rangers, community leaders, and special police to enable them to start patrolling the river and other problem areas.

Donated equipment includes:

• Garmin GPS units
• Iridium satellite phones
• DJI quadcopter drones
• MREs (ready to eat meals for consumption while on all-day or overnight patrols)
• Laptops and mapping software
• Miscellaneous camping equipment for patrols

GC also signed agreement with the Navy to assist in park protection, also a first in Peru.

3.   SMART Patrolling

Garmin GPS units allow for patrol routes to be recorded and mapped, and for areas of interest or incident to be marked. They also allow for text communication to coordinate activities. We have provided the Navy, rangers, and community with these units, enabling them to coordinate and communicate with each other in real time for the first time ever in Peru. As a result, these teams were able to conduct the first patrols inside the park and of surrounding protected areas. 

The Iridium satellite phones have also played a major role in allowing overnight and extended patrols in more remote areas of concern.

So far we have provided over 20 GPS units, two Iridium satellite phones, and four drones.

All of these data and communications can now be monitored and analyzed in a command center for real-time decision making. We supplied laptops and provided training for monitoring and mapping software and equipment. 

We also provided extensive drone training for pilots. The DJI drones have been instrumental in rangers’ raids of coca plantations and illegal logging operations. The drones allow rangers and law enforcement to scout raid locations and areas of concern while keeping a safe distance. Threats and hazards can be identified before interdictions, arrests, and raids are conducted. 

These new patrols that have been carried out as result of the data collected from our Global Park Defense program have already started producing results. 

So far, during one raid, law enforcement and the Navy destroyed ten hectares of coca and arrested five people. Another five hectares were destroyed in a separate raid. Twelve more hectares of illegal, non-sustainable crops planted by non-indigenous actors were destroyed and another twelve linear kilometers have been allocated by the communities for patrolling in more areas of need. Numerous illegal mining camps have been destroyed as well, thanks to extended river patrols. 

Timber and chainsaws were confiscated as a result of recently initiated patrol efforts that are based on GPS data and our informant network.

4.   Park Surveillance and Forest Monitoring

Drones are often launched from a boat and used to surveil narrow river channels and shallow inlets. They are also launched during land patrols to scout illegal logging and mining camps, as well as to perform reconnaissance before raids on coca fields and cocaine extraction laboratories.

The Admiral inspects a drone before releasing it for use on an overnight patrol.

The training on software for data collection and mapping has already been a great benefit to the project. For one, these newly trained personnel mapped and established the location for the ecolodge using the arcGIS program provided by Global Conservation. We are also already making detailed maps of deforestation, carbon data, areas of possible expansion, problem areas for illegal activity, patrol routes and more. 

Carbon for Forests

We are already making detailed maps of deforestation and carbon data in partnership with Arizona State University’s Asner Lab to identify areas of possible park expansion, areas facing deforestation, planning of patrol routes, etc. Read more about Carbon for Forests here.

Carbon Mapping, courtesy of Asner Lab, Arizona State University.

5.   Community-based Tourism Development

To achieve this, we are building an environmentally friendly eco-lodge at the entrance to Sierra del Divisor National Park. This will be the park’s first lodge, complete with landing dock and fast boats for transport.

The ecolodge will benefit local indigenous communities and bring sustainability to the project and will provide funding for future conservation efforts. The land for the ecolodge has already been acquired, and we have already completed the design and begun work on the tourist departure center in Pucallpa. 

The Sierra del Divisor National Park Community Ecolodge and Community Farming

The Sierra del Divisor National Park Community Ecolodge will directly benefit local communities, providing jobs and opportunities. Among other possibilities, community members can guide, sell their local goods, or work at the lodge. We are also developing a farming program that would provide land near the ecolodge for a shared community farm that would sell fresh produce, seafood, and poultry to the lodge. 

Proposed ecolodge near the park entrance.

Proposed tourist departure area in Pucallpa.

Construction begins on the tourist departure area in Pucallpa. The dock and structure will be next to the newly renovated Navy Dock.

The farm will be run jointly by the communities Nuevo Sapasoa and Patria Nueva. We will establish sustainable crops that can also be grown as food for the communities. They will also be able to sell directly to the lodge. Many of the health issues prevalent in children within the communities could be greatly reduced with a access to more fresh produce.

We will also teach sustainable fishing practices to eliminate plastic waste and ghost nets. In most cases, scraps of nets are pieced together and often fall apart, leaving pieces of netting behind in the water. The most common floats used for nets are plastic water and soda bottles, which are often discarded or become detached in the river. 

We will establish this program within the two communities mentioned, then replicate it in outlying communities. This program will ultimately provide a more balanced diet and improve health within the communities while having minimal impact on the environment.