The Farm Towns of Southern Peru's Coast

This week we were in the tiny little farm towns around Cocachacra, which are very close to the ocean 2 ½ hours west of Arequipa. The towns remind me a lot of the sleepy little farm towns of Paraguay where I spent most of my time as a missionary. Everything revolves around agriculture there. But it is completely different than the last towns in Puno because the people had tractors and seemed much better off and of course it was much warmer. It’s amazing to see the huge disparities in food security and health as we travel all around Peru. By far, the people who live high in the Andes are the poorest and least food secure. They don’t even have any tools to plant and harvest crops- “just their hands,” as they said. And basically all they live off of is the potato. Many live so far away from a health clinic that they merely just use herbal remedies to heal their families, even with infections as serious as pneumonia. At least the people around Cocachacra had a little more variety with the rice, potato, artichoke, garlic, and onion that they grow. Since everyone works in the farm fields from very early in the morning to around 5pm we only worked at night. I was sick most of the week with stomach and chivivi problems and was completely wiped out after holding our focus group discussions at night. I’m regretting not buying that box of Pepto at Cosco before I left!


The staff at Fondesurco, the NGO we are working with through Freedom from Hunger, was incredible at rounding up women for us to talk with. At night we’d show up to other tiny little towns and there would be between 50 and 100 women for us to hold out meetings with. It was amazing. Our focus group discussions were so big that it was hard to hear all the women who spoke at once, and it was hard to keep order. But having so many women was fun at the same time. They all treated us like celebrities. At the end of every meeting the Fondesurco people would hold a raffle and gave away pots and a gas stove. I thought it was somewhat ironic that they would give away a gas stove without any gas. Although it was a nice gift, the poor women in these communities probably couldn’t afford the gas.

About 1 ½ hours from here, in Moquegua, there have been blockades and riots in the streets this week with people fed up over the rising cost of food and gas. I received an email from my supervisor at BYU telling us not to travel anywhere near that city. It’s very interesting though that food security is affecting everyone here, not just the poor.


The Fondesurco staff has been great and even took us to the beach one morning and also to an overlook where a huge statue of Christ overlooks the town below called La Punta.


We’re back in Arequipa this weekend and the weather is beautiful here (70s during the day and 40s at night). It reminds me a lot of the weather in Salt Lake during the Spring and Fall. A huge extinct volcano called El Misti overlooks the city. I think this is the nicest city by far that I’ve seen in Peru. They even have a movie theater and a mall. We tried to go and see Hulk last night, but ended up not going cause it was dubbed in Spanish, instead of in English with subtitles. We went to church here today and there are even two American families that attend whose fathers work in the mining industry. We head to Chivay tomorrow for the week and Kirk might even join us next weekend there. I hear they have colder weather but some great hot springs.