Ecosystem governance in a highland village in Peru: Facing the challenges of globalization and climate change

The agricultural systems of the Peruvian Andes have been created and maintained over many generations using locally adapted management practices that help to maintain agrobiodiversity while providing for local populations. Despite their longstanding history, many of these ecosystems and the services they provide are currently threatened by a number of economic and environmental factors. We use findings from behavioral science to examine the opportunities and conflicts at different governance levels—individual, community, and global. Market pressures to produce for distant markets have resulted in reduced diversity of crops in the Andes region. Another major threat to ecosystem services in the region is climate change, which is already being observed in the form of rising temperatures, extreme temperature fluctuation, changing rainfall patterns, and increasing glacial melt. To explore the effects of, and the responses to, these pressures we used semi-structured interviews to gain insight into agricultural practices and challenges and the various levels of governance present in the agriculture of Langui, Peru. We find that low staple crop prices combined with increasing climate variability has led to a reduced production of traditional crops such as pseudocereals and tubers in favor of production of improved grasses for livestock. The growth of the livestock economy is being driven by the presence of a transnational dairy corporation in the region, plus increased migration leading to a reduced local labor force. We conclude that loss of traditional crops and community based agricultural management techniques will make it difficult for smallholders to maintain food self-sufficiency and agrobiodiversity in the face of a changing climate and global economy.