Investments in Watershed Services for the Cañete Watershed, Department of Lima, Peru
Peru Investments in Watershed Services Series
View PublicationRecognizing the need to provide national leadership, capacity-building, and coordination to the many local and regional mechanisms facilitating investments in ecosystem services throughout Peru, the Ministry of Environment of Peru (MINAM) partnered with Forest Trends to establish the Peru Ecosystem Services Incubator in 2012. The Incubator aims to enhance investments in nature by society through providing technical, financial, and economic expertise; building capacity; and contributing to the development of national policy. To do this, the Incubator works with a range of non-governmental organizations, development agencies, national authorities, and local and regional governments throughout the country who have worked for years to advance investments in ecosystems. Guided by the national prioritization of improving integrated water management, investment mechanisms linked to watershed services are the first focus of the Incubator.
The Cañete watershed, located on the central coast of Peru, is of strategic importance for nationwide agricultural production and economic development and has been selected as a pilot project to exemplify good administration of water resources based on Investment in Watershed Services (IWS). This project emphasizes the links between existing healthy ecosystems of the upper watershed that are conserved by local farming communities and the North Yauyos Lakes Landscape Reserve (a nationally recognized protected area) with the urban centers and economic activities across a broad coastal region that depend on the water services that provide adequate supply of good quality water.
