The Savvy Peoples of the Ecuadorian Amazon: Adapting to a Globalized Economy

The Savvy Peoples of the Ecuadorian Amazon: Adapting to a Globalized Economy

By Renna Voss

Photo by Neil Palmer/CIAT. [CC-BY-SA 2.0]

As a historical continuity, the success of colonialism is founded upon the displacement, exploitation, and even eradication of Indigenous populations. This concept is quite familiar to a highly colonized North America. People often remember North American colonialism as a blip in history, forgetting about the Indigenous populations that still exist in their limited territory, adapting to their neocolonial surroundings while maintaining the strength of their own cultures. In the biodiverse Amazon Basin, oil and natural resource extraction constantly threaten the ecosystem and its already displaced inhabitants (Figure 1). Primarily, deforestation augments the effects of pollution, worsens erosion, and causes habitat loss for rainforest animals and plants. Indigenous peoples in the Amazon Basin respect their lands, preserving the biodiverse ecosystems and preventing further encroachments from exploitative economic bosses. One scholar who studies this phenomenon is Clark Gray, an associate Geography professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and researcher in environment and population geography (Figure 2). He, along with fellow researcher Richard Bilsborrow, explores the relationship Figure 1. Ecuadorian Amazon Rainforest

between Indigenous groups who inhabit the Ecuadorian Amazon and their surrounding colonial market economies. Their research can be found in their study entitled Stability and Change Within Indigenous Land Use in the Ecuadorian Amazon.¹ The resulting data collection suggests that the studied Indigenous groups generally adapt to growing global markets, but each Indigenous group adapts differently, and to its own extent. This display of adaptation raises crucial questions regarding the future of these groups and their potential further adjustments. The existing environmental impacts of market economies on Indigenous lands also raise the question of whether colonial peoples have any responsibility to defend Indigenous lands from environment-degrading economic influence. The study by Gray and Bilsborrow offers remarkably unique data because researchers conducted it over a tenyear time period. This was necessary for the examination of long-term changes in Indigenous land use in the Amazon Basin. This method of field research is conducive to the observation of gradual changes that impact underrepresented populations. Indigenous groups make up 20 percent of the population of Ecuador, but 90 percent of them live in the Andes while 10 percent live in the Amazon.² Thus, only 2 percent of the Ecuadorian population are Indigenous people residing in the Amazon. This relatively small, but valuable group of humans was seldom studied with long-term consideration prior to this research. In Dr. Gray’s study, 32 Indigenous communities, representing 5 ethnicities, participated in interview-style data collection in up to 22 households per community. Interviewers used identical questionnaires in 2001 and 2012, asking heads of households about their land ownership,

agricultural production, demographics, and other related topics (Figure 3).¹ Clark Gray expresses that “collecting information directly from people” is “one of the great things about the population sciences and population geography,” as the intimate study method produces data that reflects the nuances of individual lives and viewpoints.² The results of his research reveal that although the environmental footprint of Indigenous agriculture remained consistent between 2001 and 2012, the groups adapted to surrounding market economic demands. vironment. While Indigenous populations tend to remain more isolated from mainstream economies than colonial communities, they interact with their surrounding economies just enough for them to thrive under their circumstances. Clark Gray points out the “different trajectories of […] urban adjacent Indigenous people and remote Indigenous people,” resulting in different levels of interaction with urban populations.² Considering the Shuar group’s heavy participation in land expansion for market demands, Gray refers to the urban-adjacent Shuar

Figure 2. The team of surveyors who conducted interviews in 2012 This means that the overall land area as “agricultural colonists.” Contrarily, the used by Indigenous groups kept its size, remotely located Cofàn and Waorani but the way each group used their land groups notably showed little change.¹ Inshifted as they found more opportunities digenous populations in the Ecuadorian in increasingly popular fields of agricul- Amazon are resilient when they choose tural production. to remain dissociated from colonial influOf course, changes in land owner- ence, but groups that choose to interact ship varied between specific Indigenous heavily with colonial economies prove communities. The Shuar group, for exam- to be adaptable and successful in maxiple, gained land area mizing their profits. On for their increased cat- “We should support the topic of future entle ownership, whereas them, croachment by oil comthe Kichwa group lost land area because of recognize their panies and other large industries, Clark Gray their decreased cof- independence, and recognizes the disadfee production. The si- be thankful for their vantage of handling multaneous decrease preservation of the attempted incursions in coffee cultivation and increase in cacao Amazon Basin. under circumstances of poverty, geographic cultivation was one of isolation, and social the most remarkable shifts in land use exclusion, but has utmost faith in these evident from the data. It corresponds select groups to advocate for themselves: directly to the shift in price for those “These communities are savvy, and they goods in Ecuadorian and global markets. will maneuver to extract the resources According to Clark Gray, the decrease in they want from oil companies [and] the coffee production is a result of a global government, and resist incursions that price decline, along with a plant disease they don’t want.”² and its detriment to a monoculture en- Clark Gray prioritizes the acknowl-

environmental science

edgement that Indigenous people in the Ecuadorian Amazon and their surrounding economies can work symbiotically. The market is not a threat itself. Gray’s research results shift the crucial questions regarding colonial responsibility to address the future of market influence on Indigenous peoples and encroachment on their precious lands. Gray asserts that “the question [...] is not how to defend them against the market. It’s more like, ‘How do we help them live the lives that they want to live while also protecting the forest?’”² The provision of healthcare and educational resources, Gray claims, are the clearest solutions. Perhaps the Ecuadorian Amazon’s Indigenous folks should receive benefits from the government who reaps economic benefits from their agriculture, and hopefully the global economy can switch to renewable energy sources that prevent invasion of precious rainforests and Indigenous lands. The Indigenous groups in this region are surely marginalized. They face poverty and isolation from resources, hardships on their own that also augment struggles against attempted incursions from oil companies While negotiations with companies who desire land and resource access can yield benefits for Indigenous landowners, they require effort beyond daily obligations, stress that is unique to these groups. Although these Indigenous groups face extra hardships, they manage, by no means relying on aid from colonial people. “I want to avoid the perception that they’re […] passive victims…” says Gray as he concludes his interview.² While colonial communities should provide more medical and educational resources for the marginalized Indigenous communities that protect Ecuadorian forests, no saviorism is necessary because these communities defend themselves, their cultures, and their lands. The savvy folks who protect the Ecuadorian Amazon will not go away or assimilate; that is no concern. We should support them, recognize their independence, and be thankful for their preservation of the Amazon Basin.

References

1. Gray C, Bilsborrow R. Stability and change within Indigenous land use in the Ecuadorian Amazon. Global Environmental Change. 2020;63:102116. doi:10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2020.102116 2. Interview with Clark Gray, Ph.D. 09/16/2020