With graceful hand movements, the young woman spreads the damp cassava meal evenly in concentric circles, the way her ancestors have done for centuries. Her actions reflect a people who tend to care more about the rise in the river following rainfall than what day of the month it is.
This is one typical scene in a village skirting the borders of the Iwokrama rainforest reserve. The 360,000 hectares of rainforest were selected for a unique experiment in sustainable tropical forestry management and biodiversity conservation. The experiment is the Iwokrama International Rainforest Programme, which had its genesis in a 1989 meeting of the Commonwealth Heads of Government in Kuala Lumpur. The offer to set apart such a large portion of rainforest came from the then President of Guyana, Hugh Desmond Hoyte.
Early in 1990, a Commonwealth Expert Group led by Dr M.S. Swaminathan, then President of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and now interim chairman of the Iwokrama board of trustees, began working jointly with a Guyanese inter-agency committee to establish the outlines of the program.
The area of central Guyana selected for this singular experiment is almost entirely surrounded by rivers -- the mighty Essequibo, the Siparuni, the Takatu, and the Sipariparu. In the north lies the Iwokrama Mountain Range, which lends its name to the site. Iwokrama means "place of refuge" in indigenous language. The site's pristine forests, scarcely touched by human hands, represent about 2% of the country's tropical rainforest.
IDRC has assumed a key role in Iwokrama, to advise on the establishment of the institutional, operational, research, and strategic framework for the program as well as to develop the program's information and communication unit.
"The overall idea of Iwokrama is to demonstrate how to manage the tropical forest correctly and for economic benefit and yet to keep it as a forest and sustainable," says Dr Henry Tschinkel, the Interim Director-General of Iwokrama.
"The point is to train people to demonstrate that the forest could produce more than just timber. And even so, we could produce timber in better ways so that the forest is sustainable," says Dr Tschinkel.
In Dr Tschinkel's view, Iwokrama is a unique project. "I don't know of any other case in the world where one could find this combination that we have here in Guyana. I don't know of any other case in which an institution has its own forest on a commercial scale where people practise what they preach."
Currently, most of the Iwokrama funding comes from the Global Environmental Facility and is administered by the United Nations Development Programme. According to Dr Swaminathan, Northern countries will have to invest in the program if it is to succeed. "There's no use in saying the global village or our common future if they are not going to invest in a common future," says Dr Swaminathan. "If the international community doesn't take advantage of this extraordinarily generous and unique offer, I think what will happen -- God forbid -- is the Guyanese forests may go. The same way as the neighbouring forests."
Iwokrama's core activities will focus on the sustainable utilization of the tropical rainforest, biodiversity and biofuture, ethnobiology and human ecology, education and training, and information and communication. The knowledge gained promises to be applicable far beyond the boundaries of Guyana.
According to Dr Tschinkel, carrying out these activities will not disrupt the indigenous communities that immediately adjoin the site -- Kurupukari at the northern end, Sarama at the southern end, and Annai, 20 kilometres off site. "There is no intention of displacing people," says Dr Tschinkel. "On the contrary, what we are doing is working with the people to develop their communities."
Within the boundaries of the Iwokrama site, a field station staffed by local persons has been established and already employs some indigenous people. Other forms of employment are foreseen, including work as scientific consultants, forest rangers, and tree and plant identifiers.
Fred Allicock, the field station manager, is an Amerindian who has spent most of his life in the vicinity of the Iwokrama site. He too recognizes the unique nature of the reserve and the opportunities it offers. "Iwokrama is an untouched forest .... Nobody has ever done any research, no logging, no mining. This program is not only for Guyana. It is for the Commonwealth and the international world as a whole."
Among its functions, the proposed Centre will establish a number of databases from which information could be retrieved and stored. It will be a clearing house for keeping track of the numerous studies that have been undertaken and results of research that are relevant to the program worldwide. It will also be responsible for disseminating the work being carried out through the Iwokrama program.
The team has also identified 33 varieties of bitter cassava -- well known to Amerindians but almost indistinguishable to an outsider.
Perhaps, in time, the Macuxi woman may be able to share her esoteric knowledge of cassava varieties and their properties with the rest of the world.
Claudette Earle is a journalist in Georgetown, Guyana.
Dr Henry Tschinkel
Interim Director-General
Iwokrama
c/o UNDP
41 Brickdam, P.O. Box 10960
Georgetown, Guyana
Tel: (592 2) 51504
Fax: (592 2) 59199
The Iwokrama program, the Commonwealth Expert Group said, would function under an independent board of trustees, chaired by an eminent, internationally respected person. The program would also be supported by donors and academic and professional institutions.
The Group's report made four main recommendations for Iwokrama:
mag@idrc.ca 22 January 1996