Manu People

In the Manu and Alto Madre de Dios River basins there are native human settlements that are established possibly since millennia ago; their inhabitants enjoy of free traffic as well as freedom in order to practice activities such as hunting, fishing, gathering and farming. They are part of the Park's natural balance and are allowed whenever their activities do not represent any danger for that balance. Among those groups are the Machiguengas, the Yora or Yaminahuas, the Mashco-Piros and the Amahuacas. Today, the Park authorities got in touch just with Machiguengas and Yoras. The inhabitants of those human settlements have a very peculiar way of life with effective ancestral customs and beliefs; they live in wooden houses with palmtree-leaf roofs; they weave in cotton, make pottery, cultivate goods such as manihot, uncucha, maize, papaya, pineapple, banana, etc. They hunt with arrows, spears, peashooters and stone axes. Today, some of those people live a slow process of westernization due to their approach to modern society and influence of education and communications.

CULTURAL HERITAGE The park is inhabited by at least four different native groups: the Machiguenga (or Yora), the Mascho-Piro, the Yaminahua and the Amahuaca. The best known and largest ethnic group within the park is the Machiguenga, found throughout the area with the exception of the highlands and upper parts of the Manu river. The forest indians are nomadic, mostly subsistent on some form of rootcrop agriculture on alluvial soils along river banks and lakes, on hunting along water courses and inside the forest, on fishing and on the collection of turtle eggs (Jungius, 1976). Shifting cultivation is the basic agricultural practice. In this system, a patch of primary forest or an abandoned field is cleared, burned and used during the first, second and sometimes third year for cultivation. The field is then abandoned for at least five years and a new one is opened up. As it is easier to clear secondary growth on abandoned fields than to clear the primary forest, the indians prefer to re-use old fields. These peoples are considered part of the park's natural system, and are left to use the park as they please while their lifestyle does not threaten the park's objectives.

LOCAL HUMAN POPULATION Most of the people within the park are indians. The Machiguenga tribe, which is the best known, was reported by Ferrero (1967) to have a total population of 5,000 people, and by Varese (1972) 12,000. Very little is known about the Amahuaca and Yaminahua distribution and their numbers are relatively small. Varese (1972) recorded some 4,000 Amahuaca along the Curanga, Inuya and Sepanua rivers, and 2,000 Yaminahua along the Carija Basin and Piedra Rivers. However, the management plan (La Molina, 1986) suggests that only 300-500 natives of different tribes live in the park. There are no towns in the park, but there is are some 70,000 Quechua speaking inhabitants grouped in 30 rural communities in the high Andean zone, which is adjacent to the park in the Province of Paucartambo. In 1980, most people living outside the park were miners (over 50%), the remainder being principally peasant farmers or fishermen (over 25%).