HerbalEGram: Volume 15, Issue 10, October 2018

Editor’s note: This is a follow-up to Chris Kilham’s previous field report, titled “Ayahuasca Vine Cultivation and Harvesting in the Peruvian Amazon,” published in the March 2018 issue of HerbalEGram. In his first report, the author described his multi-site field assessment of ayahuasca vine cultivation and wild-harvesting near Pucallpa and Iquitos in the Peruvian Amazon. The purpose of the first assessment was to help determine the sustainability of ayahuasca vine due to a great increase in demand for the traditional psychoactive brew that includes the vine with other plants. The brew, used in traditional religious and healing rites by native shamans, also is called ‘ayahuasca.’ 

Over the past several years, members of ayahuasca groups and various social media sites have referred to the supply of ayahuasca vine (Banisteriopsis caapi, Malpighiaceae) in Peru as imperiled and environmentally devastated, as I noted in my first report. This unsubstantiated opinion has persisted without any notable field research to support the misperception. Furthermore, ayahuasca retreat centers in Iquitos (Loreto region) and Pucallpa (Ucayali region) appear well-supplied with this vine. To the best of my knowledge, the supply of vine has so far been sufficient for the current level of demand. However, it is necessary to gather first-hand information to gain a better understanding of this issue.

Ayahuasca is a psychedelic brew typically made from the ayahuasca vine and the leaf of chakruna (Psychotria viridis, Rubiaceae) or sometimes huambisa (Diplopterys cabrerana, Malpighiaceae), as well as possibly other plant ingredients (i.e., depending on the preference of the particular shaman who is mixing the brew). It is now highly popular in these areas of Peru, as well as in other areas of the Amazon in Brazil and other South American locales. Ayahuasca also is brewed and bottled for export for increasingly popular ceremonial use in the United States (where it is legal for consumption as part of rituals associated with several South American religions) and elsewhere. Our assessments to date have involved ayahuasca vine harvesting and cultivation in Peru only.

During our previous survey, my collaborators and I were repeatedly advised by those with whom we spoke that the Rio Tamaya southeast of Pucallpa had the greatest amount of wild-harvesting and trade in the vine in Peru. Several people interviewed said that they either knew of vine traders in that area or personally dealt with them.

To follow up on the many comments regarding the Rio Tamaya, four of us undertook a field assessment on that river in June 2018. My partner in this effort was Sergio Cam of Chakarunas Trading Company. Sergio and I have worked and traveled together for 20 years, and we have explored various regions of the Amazon for at least a dozen of those years. Sergio is smart, jovial, and a tremendous asset in all of the activities in which I have engaged in Peru. He and I are ideally complementary in our work. Our two other teammates were Jaime Baca, our friend and boat driver, and Kleylie Vargas, another friend and a agroforestry engineering student of Shipibo heritage.

Ethnobotanical field work involves investigating the relationships between people and plants, and assessing various parameters of these relationships, including but not limited to indigenous plant use, size and distribution of plant populations, methods of cultivation and/or wild harvesting, and all aspects of the chain of trade, from harvest to sale. Thorough assessments also take into consideration environmental conditions, market demand, shipping costs, and other factors.

In the case of our team, we visited and stayed in native villages, spoke with people actively involved in trade, asked as many questions as we could, took photographs and notes, and reached conclusions based on the consistency of information we gathered and the conditions we witnessed. The purpose of this ayahuasca field assessment is to provide those involved in the ayahuasca scene in particular, and the botanical industry in general, with valuable, up-to-date knowledge. We derive no income from ayahuasca or from this particular research effort. All wages, expenses, and project costs for both ayahuasca field assessments were paid for entirely by my business, Medicine Hunter.

Travel to Rio Tamaya

For many years, Sergio and I have relied consistently on Jaime Baca for logistical support, and to captain any boat we use. He has proven highly resourceful and has always added great value to our investigations. For our trip to the Rio Tamaya, Jaime found a good boat: aluminum, covered, and about 18 feet long. The middle of the boat was dominated by an enormous plastic petrol barrel that held more than 60 gallons of fuel. A covered boat is essential to prevent burning from the scorching sun and getting drenched by regular, hard rains.

We shipped out from the port of Pucallpa and headed southeast to the Shipibo native village of Caimito on the Rio Tamaya, where we were previously told there was a large plantation of ayahuasca vine. The river trip from Pucallpa to Caimito took most of the day, from 9:15 am to 5:15 pm, with a brief lunch stop in the ramshackle village of Puerto Allegre. In subsequent days, Puerto Allegre would play a role in some unfortunate incidents involving loss of life.

Caimito lies on the shores of the majestic Lago Imiria, through which the Rio Tamaya runs. When we arrived in Caimito, we were helped with our bags and led to the home of an elderly Shipibo woman named Elizabeth Ancon Amaringo, who graciously invited us to share her house. Each building in the village was equipped with solar panels, so we had electricity and light. Kleylie, who speaks fluent Shipibo and grew up in that area, proved a great help in translating. She also turned out to be well-known and much admired as a young, successful native woman who is doing good work in Pucallpa. Many people either knew her or knew of her, and expressed pride in her pursuit of a degree in agroforestry engineering. To many villagers, Kleylie is an inspiration. 

After we stored our gear in Elizabeth’s house, we met with some village men who explained that except for a few vines here and there, no ayahuasca grows in Caimito. We asked about the plantation we’d heard of and were told that there was no such plantation. The information we had received was utterly worthless. This happens sometimes.

A man named Moises Arevalo, who is the cousin of the famous Shipibo shaman Guillermo Arevalo, told us that there used to be plenty of ayahuasca around Caimito, but that most of it was harvested and sold. According to Arevalo and another man, the nearby village of Junin Pablo was the center of a bustling trade in ayahuasca vine where ayahuasca vine harvesters and traders lived. Arevalo took us around Caimito, showed us some remaining vines and explained that they were used only for local ceremonies.

As evening approached, a woman in the village prepared fish, rice, and plantains (Musa × paradisiaca, Musaceae) for us. This is fairly typical in such villages, where women and men will prepare food for visitors to supplement their income, providing travelers and visitors with meals. Arevalo stopped by and offered me ayahuasca brew that he and a few other men from the village were preparing to drink. I declined the offer because it is advisable to wait many hours between eating food and drinking ayahuasca. But I was touched and grateful for his kind offer.

In the morning, we bathed in the lake because there is no running water in Caimito. The village has numerous well pumps, none of which work. After the morning bath, I made coffee, which both Sergio and I consider absolutely essential on any project. After our crew drank coffee and ate biscuits, we gathered our gear and headed back out onto the river into a heavy morning mist. 

After about 40 minutes, we arrived in Junin Pablo, a 3,550-hectare (8,772-acre) community along Lago Imiria. Fourteen villages occupy the shores of the lake. Along the way, Sergio twice smelled the scent of coca (Erythroxylum coca, Erythroxylaceae) cooking in the jungle. We did not realize it at the time, but the area where we were traveling is heavily occupied by armed narco traffickers and is largely a lawless region.

Once we landed at Junin Pablo, we were greeted by several men who cheerfully helped us with our boat and belongings. We stored our gear temporarily at the home of a man named Matteo Teco, one of the primary ayahuasca harvesters and dealers in the village. Jaime was aided by a couple of men from the village in stashing the outboard motor in a secure building to avoid theft. 

According to Matteo, ayahuasca buyers regularly show up in Junin Pablo to acquire ayahuasca vine. Alternately, harvesters in Junin Pablo boat their collected vine to Pucallpa, and sell it at the waterfront to dealers who remain on the lookout for shipments. Matteo says that harvesters have their favorite spots, and that there is a lot of vine growing in the areas around Lago Imiria.

We set off to find lodging for our stay in Junin Pablo. In the clouded heat, we headed over to a four-room lodge, which turned out to be occupied. We were directed to another spartan, four-room building in the village, where we were able to secure a place to stay. 

Once we had secured lodging, Matteo took us on a tour of the many ayahuasca vines growing in the village, some young and some old. According to Matteo, the vines in the village do not get harvested except for use by local shamans. In the course of the village tour he also showed us chakruna that had gone to seed.

Junin Pablo proved sweltering, dusty, and hot during the day, with intermittent epic rain. It also proved a feasting ground for hungry, aggressive mosquitoes. After the trip, I succumbed to a fierce case of malaria that would set me back for the better part of a month. (I was able to successfully treat the disease using Artemisia annua, the Chinese herb from which the effective antimalarial compound artemisinin was derived.)

The village features wide dirt avenues that were swept every day. This minimizes snake traffic and clears away the tootsie rolls of desiccated dog feces that seem to be everywhere. The materials swept up are burned along the edges of the avenues, and this keeps the village quite neat overall. Luciano, the owner of the place where we stayed, told us of a nearby area called Chaoya where a lot of ayahuasca can be found in the forest. This, we learned later, was one of Matteo Teco’s primary harvesting spots.


Junin Pablo Ayahuasca Committee

In the late morning of our first day in Junin Pablo, Sergio, Kleylie, and I met in a small community center building with the village chief Ronald Cauper and a man named Nikeas Vasquez, who is the head of a newly formed ayahuasca committee that was established to put some order to the wild-harvesting in the area. Jaime did not join us, as he was already engaged in a marathon poker game.

According to the two men, buyers from Pucallpa started arriving in Junin Pablo in 2014, requesting ayahuasca. Around the same time, other people showed up from Pucallpa and began to harvest vine without permission from the local communities. In 2017, Vasquez and a few others started a committee to develop a plan for wild harvesting. Both Cauper and Vasquez told us that when harvesters sell to visitors who come to Junin Pablo, they get only 40 soles per 30-kg bundle (fresh). At the current exchange rate (August 2018), this is about $12.17, a poor wage for difficult forest labor.

Cauper and Vasquez also told us of a US group that arrived in the community in 2017, proposing a project to purchase large quantities of vine. According to the two men, the group offered to pay 100 soles per 30-kg bundle to start, 200 soles once the project was up and running, and eventually 500 soles per bundle. In this scheme, the harvesters would receive the money. Supposedly, the Americans wanted people from the community to cook pure vine, without any chakruna, to ship out. This proposed project has not yet begun, but Cauper and Vasquez were hopeful about the prospect.

Shipping ayahuasca out of Peru to other countries like Costa Rica, Mexico, and the United States may serve the interests of people who wish to drink outside of Peru, but it puts significant pressure on the supply of vine. Demand for ayahuasca continues apace, and exports could well prove a big threat to sustainability.

Cauper and Vasquez expressed eagerness for financial support for their committee. They also told us that some academic investigators were in the village conducting an ayahuasca project, and they suggested that we might want to meet and speak with them.

As we spoke with different people, we heard varying prices for ayahuasca. We were told that harvesters get 30 or 40 soles per 30 kg bundle. We were also told by several people that vine sells for 80 soles per 30 kg bundle to traders at the port of Pucallpa.  


Conversations with Matteo Teco

As we spent several days in the Rio Tamaya area, we had ample opportunity for conversation. In the case of Matteo Teco, we spoke several times. Matteo has been involved with ayahuasca harvesting for about five years, since 2013. He supplies vine to about 50 customers on a regular basis, harvesting an average of 120 30-kg bundles, or about 3,600 kg of vine, per month. He said that over time he has had to walk an additional 10 minutes into the forest to obtain ayahuasca. 

Matteo and others told us that the vine sells for 80 soles per bundle to buyers in Pucallpa. Matteo hires other harvesters and pays them 30 soles per bundle. He also pays 5 soles for each bundle for boat transport to Pucallpa, where he ships every week or every other week. In the case of shipping vine to Pucallpa, his gross profit per bundle, after shipping, is 45 soles. In this case, a month’s harvest of 120 30-kg bundles or a total of 3,600 kg of vine would result in 5,400 soles profit, or roughly $1,644.

Matteo tells us that more people are coming into the Lago Imiria area from outside, pulling out 60 or 70 loads at a time, and charging 30 soles per bundle. There is a goldrush mentality, and outside harvesters may not leave enough of each vine to regenerate. Matteo says that the local areas of Chaoya, Saweta, Mapuye, and Michaya are rich with vine. The big problem is that narco traffickers control a lot of territory where there is vine, and one has to get their permission to go into many areas to avoid getting shot. There is a great deal of coca cultivation and cooking in the general area, and virtually no law enforcement. By law, coca cultivation and refining are illegal, but we saw no police or coast patrols in the Rio Tamaya area during our stay. 

On our second morning in Junin Pablo, we were informed that a few hours earlier three people were found shot dead nearby, possibly by robbers who work the river. The dead were apparently from outside the area, and details were sketchy. A couple of people cautioned us about Puerto Allegre, where we had previously stopped for lunch, saying that robbers and narcos frequent that village. It definitely had the look of a seedy frontier town. We were told that robbers usually have rifles, and that narcos in the region often carry automatic weapons. The majority of arms in villages, by contrast, are single-shot shotguns. The disparity in firepower keeps the villagers cautious.


A Student Ayahuasca Survey

We set out to find the academic group we’d been told of by Cauper and Vasquez, at a small lodging in the village. Under a blue tarp awning at a picnic bench we met Michael Coe, a PhD candidate from the University of Hawaii at Manoa; Laura Dev, a master’s student at UC Berkeley; and Marcos Maynas and Hammes Werner Reinecke, both from Alianza Arkana. An alliance that promotes the interests of the Amazon rainforest, indigenous peoples, and rainforest biodiversity, Alianza Arkana made for a natural participant in an ayahuasca sustainability survey.

The information they were gathering, as they described to us, included population density of ayahuasca vine, community benefits related to harvesting and trade, genetic diversity of cultivated vine, and the long-term impact of wild-harvesting. Coe explained that he needed to finish his doctoral thesis, and that the data collection from 2018 was essential to that end. Financial support for the project had dried up, so Coe was footing the bill.  

According to the four, in 2017, they plotted several plots of forest 2-3 hectares in size, in and around Lago Imiria, and tagged a number of ayahuasca vines in those plots. This year, they returned to record the vines’ size and growth. When they revisited the plots, the team discovered a high level of harvesting. More tagged vines were gone than remained. Coe made it clear that they considered one year to be an inadequate amount of time to assess ayahuasca sustainability, and that he wanted to continue for five more years. I suggested to the group that they might want to supplement their knowledge by speaking with the village traders, who seemed very well informed about the supply.


Conversation with Antonio Sinarhua Cauper

Antonio Cauper lives in a somewhat remote corner of Junin Pablo by the river. He said that he is in touch with 14 people who buy vine on a regular basis, and he supplies them all. He also supplies Jimmy Rojas in Pucallpa, who we interviewed for part one of this ayahuasca assessment. Antonio told us that he would like to cook and sell finished ayahuasca, but has found no interest from buyers. That was not a surprise to me, as various people cook ayahuasca with different proportions of vine and leaf.

According to Antonio, orders come in every day, typically around 15-20 bundles per customer. Amenities may be modest in Junin Pablo, but many people have mobile phones, so he is able to know what customers need. He spends much of his time in the forest cutting vine and said that he has to go several minutes further into the woods than before to harvest. Antonio gets between 60 and 80 soles per bundle of vine. He told us that when he brings a boatload of ayahuasca to Pucallpa, he is very easily spotted by buyers who go to his boat to purchase what he brings. 

Antonio explained that two types of ayahuasca vine grow in the area, amarilla (yellow), and negro (black). Amarilla is preferred because it looks nicer cooking in a pot, whereas the negro looks burned. I had heard similar stories when conducting the first part of the assessment in January 2018.

At first, Antonio was reluctant to show us any loads of vine. But he relaxed as we hung out, and he eventually disappeared briefly, returning with a bundle of vine on his back. He estimated the vine to be 20 years of age, and said that there was a lot of vine of similar size and age in the forest, and some much bigger and older. He claimed to know of 80-year-old vines where he harvests. 

For 27 years, Antonio has worked with ayahuasca. This makes him one of the most experienced harvesters in the Peruvian Amazon, and certainly one of the most longtime suppliers. For the last five years, since 2013, he has witnessed a significant increase in demand. I asked him if he is happy with the money he makes, and he said “no.” I then asked him if he wants more business, to which he replied “yes.”

After speaking with us for a while, Antonio decided that it was ok to show us a boatload of newly harvested vine. We walked down the road with him a bit, and then cut through a grassy path to the lake shore, where he had stashed a boat in high grass, obscured by a tree. He pulled the boat over so we could get a better look. The boat was filled with approximately 25 bundles of the same 20-year-old vine, each bundle weighing about 30 kg. At 60 soles per bundle, he’d gross about 1,500 soles altogether, or a little more than $456. At 80 soles per bundle, he’d make about 2,000 soles, or about $609. It is a modest sum for hard sweaty work, in a forest filled with snakes, in an area populated by narco traffickers. 


We Exit

During our stay in Junin Pablo, we were repeatedly cautioned regarding our safety getting back to the Ucayali River and to Pucallpa, via the Rio Tamaya. The morning we planned to leave, two more people were found shot dead nearby, adding to local tensions regarding safety in the area. Chief Ronald Cauper and Nikeas Vasquez sought us out to advise us to hire an armed guard for the trip out. Luciano, the host of our lodging, had previously introduced us to a guard named Fermine, who we hired for the boat trip. Fermine came with a shotgun and a pocket full of shells, little defense against automatic weapons of narco traffickers or the rifles of pirates. Still, an armed guard can serve as a warning.

We departed Junin Pablo at 7:20 am and made a dead run to Pucallpa, exiting the Rio Tamaya and arriving in Pucallpa at noon sharp.


Conversation with Pucallpa Trader Carlos Chauca

Once ayahuasca vine hits the docks of Pucallpa, much of it makes its way to various ayahuasca retreats and to people who cook ayahuasca for a living to resell. We know from the survey we conducted in January 2018 that ayahuasca centers in and around Pucallpa and Iquitos pay upwards of 150 soles per sack. One center outside of Pucallpa we interviewed for the last survey, Los Cielos, pays significantly more. Bundles of ayahuasca tied together with other vines get transferred into sacks, which then make their way to these customers. I have personally observed dozens of shipments of such sacks at centers, and have observed and participated in the making of ayahuasca with the vines contained in those sacks. The trade in vine, and the making of ayahuasca, are highly popular now, and ayahuasca brew is very much in demand.

In between harvesters like Matteo Teco, Antonio Cauper, and the ayahuasca centers and cookers, traders purchase and re-sell vine. One such trader is Carlos Chauca in Pucallpa.

Carlos sells cat’s claw (both species, Uncaria tomentosa,  Rubiaceae, and U. guianensis), chuchuhuasi (Maytenus krukovii, Celastraceae), ayahuasca vine, and copaiba (Copaifera officinalis, Fabaceae) oleoresin. Sergio and I visited with Carlos at his warehouse distribution center to gather information about his trade in ayahuasca vine. During our time there, several men were loading a large truck with sacks of cat’s claw.

Carlos purchases around 700-800 kg of ayahuasca vine per month, the equivalent of 23-26 30-kg sacks or bundles. He stores the vine rather unceremoniously in the corner of his warehouse, selling it for 3.5 soles per kg, equivalent to 105 soles per 30 kg bundle. Carlos also has ayahuasca brew prepared for him, which he sells for 60 soles per liter, the lowest price we have encountered. Previous prices we have been given for prepared ayahuasca have ranged between 100 and 820 soles (between $30 and $250) per liter. Carlos described his sales of ayahuasca as incidental but steady relative to the sale of the other botanicals he trades. 


Summary

As far as I can determine, the supply of wild ayahuasca is holding for now. But this will end at some point. There is no adequate way to assess how much vine remains in the vast Amazonian forest. But both Matteo Teco and Antonio Cauper have described areas of abundant and largely untouched wild vine around the shores of Lago Imiria. Due to heavy rains and deep mud, our team did not go into the forest with either trader to harvest. This would be an obvious next step.

The popularity of ayahuasca appears to be steadily increasing, and demand for the brew outside of Peru is on the rise as well. Now it is no longer a matter of supplying ayahuasca centers in Pucallpa and Iquitos, and small village ceremonies. Demand for prepared ayahuasca from outside of the country unquestionably compounds the pressure on wild populations of vine. This demand will certainly hasten the scarcity of the plant over time.

This is a classic situation in the herbal trade. A wild product becomes popular, and this puts pressure on populations of that plant. Clearly, cultivation is the way forward. Cultivation assures sustainability and offers full traceability of materials. It also opens up new economic opportunities for individuals and communities. Since ayahuasca likes to climb trees, vines can be planted in wooded areas, and the trees can be preserved as the ayahuasca, not timber, becomes the focus of economic gain. 

As I pointed out in the first report, the work my collaborators and I have conducted is by no means full and complete. It is a snapshot, but an insightful one. Thus far, we have been successful in getting good and relatively consistent information from key players in ayahuasca harvesting, cultivation, and preparation. At the same time, it is obvious to me and to my teammates that we will need to continue these assessments.

Acknowledgements 

Any project of this kind is a team effort. I wish to express my thanks and appreciation to Sergio Cam, Jaime Baca, and Kleylie Vargas. Without their participation and combined talents, I could not have conducted this work. Thanks also to the various individuals along the Rio Tamaya who took time to aid us, showed us around, allowed us to photograph, and provided the information included in this report.

Chris Kilham is a medicine hunter, author, and educator. He has conducted medicinal plant research in more than 40 countries, is the author of 15 books, and has appeared on hundreds of TV programs globally. CNN has called Chris “The Indiana Jones of Natural Medicine.” More information is available at www.MedicineHunter.com


Photo captions:
-Ayahuasca (Banisteriopsis caapi)
-Jaime Baca, Kleylie Vargas, and Sergio Cam
-A view of the Rio Tamaya
-Kleylie Vargas, Chris Kilham, and Elizabeth Amaringo
-Moises Arevalo with ayahuasca
-Lago Imiria
-Matteo Teco with ayahuasca
-Nikeas Vasquez and Chief Ronald Cauper
-Hammes Reinecke, Michael Coe, Laura Dev, and Marcos Maynas
-The author with Antonio Cauper
-Antonio Cauper with a boatload of ayahuasca
-Carlos Chauca with Chuchuhuasi
-Sergio Cam with ayahuasca at Carlos Chauca’s warehouse
-The author’s team

 All photos ©2018 Chris Kilham