The Peruvian biologist who has planted three million trees in the Andes

Constantino Aucca Chutas was captivated by the song of the birds in the cloud forests.

At the beginning of his career as a researcher in Peru, the biologist delved into the plant network with the Danish ornithologist Jon Fjeldsa, and classified the most unlikely species.

Now 58 years old, he is dedicated to preserving and rehabilitating these forests throughout the Andes.

In a matter of two decades he has helped plant nearly three million trees, from Colombia to Argentina, some 7,014 kilometers.

On November 21, the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) distinguished him as one of the Champions of the Earth in the category of Inspiration and Action.

Cloud forests are key to the complex hydrology of the tropical Andes, which encompasses Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia.

It has great differences in precipitation, humidity and temperatures, since they grow from 3,500 meters up to the very border of life, near the glacial ice of the snowy peaks of the Andes, even above Mont Blanc (a 4,809 meters above sea level).

The undisputed sovereign is the queñua or yagual (

), a tree with a twisted trunk and very hard wood that can live for hundreds of years.

Other native species resistant to the rigors of the high altitude climate are the qolle (

), the Andean alder (

) and the chachacomo (

).

Community work in the community of Quelqanqa, Cusco, Peru. Marco Zileri

“These native forests retain and store water, generate soil with organic decomposition, are germplasm banks and habitat for numerous species.

They capture carbon dioxide (CO₂), control watersheds and erodible soils”, Aucca describes.

These are such unique ecosystems that many of the flora and fauna species that inhabit these forests are endemic.

Urged by the predatory action of man, the birds act like the canary in the mines: if they stop singing it is because their habitat is threatened or has disappeared, an unequivocal warning sign of climate change.

The birds act like the canary in the mines: if they stop singing it is because their habitat is threatened or has disappeared, an unequivocal warning sign of climate change.

Protect the queñuales and Andean biodiversity

In its unusual pilgrimage, Aucca has forged alliances with Andean peasant communities, with whom it annually organizes massive reforestation days and training on sustainable management of natural resources.

He also manages the recognition of natural, private or public conservation areas, which already total 16 —a total of 300,000 hectares— in Peru alone.

Along the way, with a couple of colleagues, he founded the Andean Ecosystems Association (Ecoan) in 2001, an NGO whose mission is to protect primary forests, headwaters, and wetlands to preserve water resources and soils, based in Cusco, southeast of the country.

Since 2018, the organization's community reforestation model, which the United Nations has supported, is also applied in Colombia, Ecuador, Bolivia, Chile and Argentina, in partnership with Global Forest Generation, Conservation International, American Bird Conservancy and Wetlands International.

Over the next 25 years, Acción Andina, as this international aspect is called, plans to protect 500,000 hectares of queñual forests and plant another 500,000 hectares.

“Deforestation is running at a faster rate and climate change is hitting us hard,” explains Aucca.

Community involvement in planting the right tree in the right place is an important element of any reforestation program.

Tim Christophersen, UNEP ecosystem expert

In the Andes, “the high concentration of the population in urban areas (more than 66%) generates material demands for the production and consumption of both water and new agricultural products and energy.

This transforms the environment, land cover and use, and hydrological systems, at multiple scales”, warned the General Secretariat of the Andean Community a decade ago.

The Peruvian scientist works above all with indigenous communities, with solid organizational bases, which, historically, have developed adaptation practices to climate variability.

Queñua forest in the páramo of Tunguraque, Ecuador.Marco Zileri

Tim Christophersen, an ecosystem expert at UNEP, the United Nations Environment Programme, explains that "protecting tropical forests while restoring degraded forests and other ecosystems could represent up to 30% of the immediate solution to climate change."

“Community participation in planting the right tree in the right place is an important element of any reforestation program,” he pointed out.

"The verb has to be clear and simple," says Aucca about his dealings with the community members.

“When we speak in the name of conservation and we mention the problem of water, that's where they stop their ears!” He narrates.

It is not usually difficult to persuade them of the benefits of protecting and restoring natural environments —public authorities and institutions can be a tougher nut to crack—, and when they are committed they deploy ancestral mutual aid schemes called

in Quechua.

Against the light, in these amazing forests, the spatula-tailed hummingbird (

) flutters, a sign of hope.

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