Geopolitics of the alpaca
Calling the things by its own name
Some time ago we wrote an article about the classification of the alpacas according to the placefrom they were imported: Peru, Chile and Bolivia. In Peru we see this kind of classification as a lack ofknowledge about the history of the alpaca and its natural territories. The alpaca was developed5,000 years ago by the old Peruvians. During the last 1,500 years the Peruvian territories included allBolivia (it was call "upper Peru"), the north and center parts ofChile and the North West of Argentina. It is just on the last 182 years that these territories are independent. But the alpaca animaldoesn't know about political affairs (it shouldn't!).
The alpaca herds develops different qualities in some farms due to the efforts andcircumstances of this or that specific farm. Thinking that the governments ofChile, Bolivia, or Peru have made "national" efforts and have reach a standard level on each territory is a lack of understanding of the geography of the involved territories. The alpaca is one, there is notsuch thing as a "Bolivian" or "Chilean" alpaca. Quality of the Bolivian herds is different, not standardized. Quality ofthe Chilean herds is different too, not standardized. The same inPeru. Maybe one Peruvian animal is more similar to one Bolivian animalthat 2 Bolivians between them. Or maybe some Chilean animal is moresimilar to a Bolivian animal than to other Chilean alpacas. The alpaca isjust one. And, if we have to put a name in front of the animal we have torecognize that most of the exported alpacas come from Peru and were Peruvian onorigin. Peru has 4 million alpacas. Chile has 30,000 alpacas at most. How can Chile export 4,000 alpacas each year?In year 2000 Chileans have said that they will export 20,000 alpacas toEngland. How this can be possible if their national population is just30,000 at most! Smuggling the alpacas from Peru is the only answer.
We have been explaining this to manypeople. But yesterday we felt on the good company of all the newspapers andTV stations. All of them reproduced the conference that the Minister of Agriculturegave in Ayaviri, Puno. He said that a "special task group" will be formed to fight against theChilean smugglers that comes to pick up the best of our Peruvian alpaca.
I will translate the most important part of the document, and the originaldocument (in spanish) can be found on the original site (http://www.elcomercio.com.pe)or in the "cached" version on ourwebsite.
Free translation of the article published by the main peruvian newspaper. El Comercio Peru. April 24.
The alpaca becomes a recognized national commercial symbol
A committee will be created to fight against the alpaca smuggling from Peru to Chile
The alpaca industry bring 80 millions of dollars every year. The alpaca was recognized as a national commercial symbol. It is a group of products where the alpaca is in the company of thePeruvian pisco (liquor), the Peruvian horse (or Peruvian step horse) and the"Peruvian box" (musical instrument made of a simple wood box but with fantastic construction technique that brings a totally different sound). All of them represent resources that are symbols of our nationality.
The Minister (secretary) of agriculture said that the alpaca generate 80 million dollars every year and it is the source of employment and labor for more than 120 thousand families in the rural area of Peru. In the same way the alpaca means the work for 22 thousand families on the textile labor that is done in Puno, Arequipa, Lima and other cities in Peru.
The Minister said that it is unbelievable that country neighbors like Chile export every year 4 thousand alpacas when its national alpaca population is 20,000 alpacas or, at most, they have 30,000 alpacas. In the other side Peru has 3 million alpacas and export only 1,000 alpacaannually.
The Minister denunciate the existence of smuggling of alpacas. This is done by businessmen that buy our more valuable animals aridiculous price (less than 100 dollars each head). Then the animals are smuggled trough thePeruvian - Bolivian border line and, finally, they are pass to Chile where they are exported at prices prices between 15,000 to 50,000 dollars.
In his declaration, the Minister, Mister Jorge Leon, said to the alpaca farmers that it was not fair that foreigners travel around our country selecting the best alpacas that later are smuggled outside of the country.
To stop this activity, that is against the national interest. he announced the start of atask committee that will be formed by the sectors of agriculture, the alpaca farmers, the defense minister, the police minister and the public attorney. The task will be to identify, capture and put SANCTION over the shoulders of thepeople involved on the alpaca illegal trade. In one word: to stop the smugglers.
End of free translation
Smuggling animals from Peru to Chile is not a fantasy. All the newspapers on Lima has reflected the words of the Minister of Agriculture, Mr.Jorge Leon, because all investigation departments know that this has happen sincemany years ago.
Some Chilean companies, according to their words, export alpacas from Chile. But90% of all the places that they mention and almost all the photos are taken on Peruvian places. ThePeruvian authorities are studying every case and they have recorded those internet places so the owners can not change the data. SomeBritish citizens (there is good and bad people everywhere!) are involved on this alpacasmuggling.
How a Japanese citizen help alpaca smugglers during 10 years
Alpaca was no allowed to be exported until 1992. Allowing the export ofalpacas and not been able to recognize the legal animals from the illegal was atragedy. It was not done by a casual affair. Nothing was casualduring the former government. Discussion stays on how many money they havesteal. Some investigation reports 2,000 million dollars others say 10,000million dollars. Ten years of dictatorship have allowed the smuggling ofalpacas without one sign of worry from the Fujimori's government. Mr. Fujimori,and his group of generals, took the power by the force of the guns on April 51992. Some civilians that are genocides, and low class politicians. wereinvolved on this sad fact. Now all of them are are PERSECUTED by the Peruvianjustice all over the world.
Mr. Fujimori, a Japanese citizen who fake its nationality, or used his double nationality, authorized the export ofalpacas without a free congress and without elected functionaries. 90% of the top politicians andfunctionaries of those years are in trouble with the justice. 1,300 are with pending trials and around 150 are onjail. This is one of the few times in Peruvian history where the top generalsand functionaries of the former government are in jail. The former firstminister and one of the top generals are running as fugitives all over theworld. Owners of newspapers and TV stations that got bribing fromFujimori's group are fugitive outside of the country.
Bad thing about smuggling is that the alpacafarmers got less than one hundred dollars for each animal. Good thingabout smuggling is that, due to the nature of the territory and the nature ofthe alpaca herds, there were many "niches" that were not touched bysmugglers. Lucky we are that all the visitors to the AlpacaFiesta 2003 inArequipa have saw the quality of the champions and the general quality of theherds that were present. Any champion can be bought and smuggled toChile. But on that specific farm there is more "champions"..many more!. Not all farms are the same, not all animals arechampions. But there is many of them. Conservative numbers say thatour top animals are just 10% of the population. Since we have 4 millionanimals this could say that we have around 400,000 top animals on Peru. Chile total population (good and bad animals) is between 20,000 to 30,000 heads.
But smuggling our products to Chile is not new. Books that are on our power, written byChilean citizens around 1890, tell by their own mouth that they know very well that thePeruvian treasures of the old churches can be easily smuggled using the Peruvian- Bolivian border and then pass to Chile. Nothing new on the conduct of our neighbors.
The historical problems that Peru and Bolivia have with the Chileans
Chile has got serious problem in this month (April 2004) with Bolivia. Bolivia has signed agreement with Argentina toexport natural gas. But the argentines are not allowed to re-export to Chie. Bolivian peopledon't want to give any gas to Chile until they sit on a table to talk about the territories that Chile took by the force of the weapons in 1879. This territories included all theBolivian coast. So, due to this war, Bolivian became a country without coast or sea ports.
Peru and Bolivia are not what we can call "good neighbors" with Chile. In year 1879 we got aterrible war.
We lost the war due to some facts. Facts made the history. Some data will show the kind of war that it was. In one of the lastbattles, the battle for Lima, Chile send 40,000 professional soldiers. Peru put 20,000 men (5,000 regular soldiers and 15,000 recruits with no experience) to stop them. Chile got 1,000dead people and 2,000 wounded. Peru got 10,000 dead people. 2 days later, the last barrier was formed, every man in the city, the major, thecongressmen, the politicians, the owners of newspapers, the top and high class left their homes to go to the defense points around the city. Chile got part of their reserves toreinforce their lines and put again 40,0000 men in front of 20,000 "last minute"Peruvian combatants. Chile got around 3,000 dead and 7,000 wounded. Peru got other 10,000 dead men. How manyPeruvian wounded? No wounded Peruvians. Chilean army didn't take prisoners. They have pick up a group of 3,000Chinese workers found on the plantations on the Peruvian coast (they were treated like slaves by the rich owners of some coast farms). The Chilean army organize this group ofChinese to follow the Chilean army on its attack. The task of the Chinese were to kill allPeruvian wounded men and the general order was not take prisoners.
We lost due to the fact that our country was the weakest nation of all Latin America. Not weakest on the economic sense but the weakest on the relationship and unity inside the groups andsocial classes in the Peruvian society. Due to the fact that Peru was the strongest point of theSpanish colony in South America, all libertarian movements that came from the south (with San Martin and Cochrane) and from the North (with Bolivar and Sucre) tried to keep thePeruvian society separated and with internal fights. Nothing best for their interest that the strongest point of economic andmilitary influence during more than 300 hundred years (Peru) became a place with nomilitary or economic power that can not compete with the local economies that were developed on the north and south parts of thePeruvian territory.
What we know today as Ecuador, Colombia, half Venezuela, half Chile, the north part of Argentina, all Bolivia, all those territories, and the actualPeruvian territory, were during 300 years the "Spanish colony in the Peruvian territories". TheSpaniards took what the Inca empire had build. They took 5,000 years of Inca's history and territories. As simple as that, and theykept it for 300 years. It is just 182 years ago that the countries on this part of the continent gotits liberty from the Spaniard kingdom. And it is 182 years ago that we have put on our national shield 3 symbols: thecornucopia with gold, a quinine tree, and the finest camelid that we have: the vicuna.90% of all vicunas are in Peru and that's another "national commercial symbol" that we proudly have.
The rest is the history of our days.
It is not realistic to develop lines based on the airport used to ship theanimals
So, the alpaca is now a recognized "national commerce symbol". Since we are sharing this precious fiber with the world we think that we have the right to call the things by its name: all alpacas, in one way or another, are ofPeruvian origin.
Like in our first article, that you can consult on our website (http://www.alpacaperu.com/Peruvian,_Bolivian_and_Chilean_Alpacas.html) we think that alpaca farming industry must concentrate on improving the quality ofthe herds based on quality of the animal and quality of the fiber. At theeyes of the history and the facts, it doesn't make sense to "build" lines based onwhich "national airport" was used to ship the alpacas. In the end this is a matter of fiber characteristicsof the group of alpacas that were available to the companies that exported thisanimals. How they got the first animals? Combination of luck,"walking distance", willingness of the sale man, access to somefarms. But in no way we can think that this small group represent thequality of the national herds on each country. There is not such thing asnational herds. As simple as that.
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