Meetings with local community members continue with the most recent being with indigenous tribe Tolupan. The Yoro Biological Corridor (YBC) team met with the Directing Council of the Tolupan Tribe in the town of El Suntular to discuss their issues and potential opportunities with the corridor.
The Tolupan population originates from pre-Hispanic times as semi-nomadic hunter-gatherers. Today tribes vary in their lifestyles, some of which include the more traditional hunting with a bow and even abstaining from contact with strangers, but many also now include various forms of farming. For more about the Tolupan people, see here.
The meeting, which ended very positively, is an important new aspect of the YBC project. Since the Tolupan people live within the geographical borders of the forest corridor the YBC teams have this responsibility and proponents are also glad for the opportunity to engage them and learn more about their needs. It was agreed to meet on a regular basis.
Along for the meeting was Skarleth (below), who is currently at university studying the costs of organic farming vs. conventional. Skarleth was also hired by the YBC team to work on the 600 coffee farm survey aimed at gauging farmers’ interest in adopting the Yoro Model’s Integrated Open Canopy™ (IOC) coffee farming.
