The valuable peatlands of Peru’s Pastaza River Fan: one of the world’s largest carbon reservoirs

On the banks of the Pastaza River, in Peru’s northern Datem del Marañón province, Kietre Gonzales remembers just how close his childhood home was to the aguajales, the swampy palm forests so common in this part of the Peruvian Amazon. But over time, the landscape began to change. The aguajes (Mauritia flexuosa), the palms that bear the wine-red fruit of the same name, started to be cut down.

“Fifteen years ago, we ourselves were destroying them. We used to cut down the aguaje palm to harvest its fruit, leaving empty spaces where other kinds of weeds would grow. We started cutting them down because there were no initiatives to protect them,” says Gonzales, a member of the Recreo Native Community, part of the Kichua Indigenous people.

At the foot of a tree along the riverbank, Gonzales looks up at the broad leaves of the aguaje palms rising above the distant vegetation, where the bright green of the community sports field ends beneath a clear sky and a scorching sun that makes the skin glisten. A rooster crows, breaking his contemplation of the landscape. “Now we understand that we must not cut down the trees of the Amazon,” he says.

The aguajal peat bogs that still survive in this part of the Amazon are part of the Pastaza River Fan Wetland Complex, one of the deepest peatland systems in the world — the third-deepest tropical peatland, at more than 8.1 meters (26.6 feet), after Central Kalimantan in Indonesian Borneo and the Cuvette Centrale in the Congo Basin.

In 2002, the Pastaza River Fan Wetland Complex was also designated a Ramsar Site, in recognition of its global importance as a wetland. Its more than 3.8 million hectares (9.4 million acres) of forest are home to nearly 300 species of fish, 261 species of birds, and a rich variety of mammals, amphibians and reptiles.

But that’s not all — it has also gained global importance for its ability to help mitigate the effects of climate change through carbon storage.

Today, members of the native communities that inhabit the area, including the Achuar, Kichua, Kandozi, Awajún, Wampis, Chapra and Shawi peoples, are working to protect the peatlands from extractive activities.

The high demand for aguaje in Amazonian regions, driven by its health benefits — it has five times as much vitamin A as carrots — has fueled growing pressure on this forest species.

There are other threats, too. Deforestation, illegal mining, oil and gas drilling activities, and shifting land use, among other pressures, are becoming increasingly common across the region.

The need for peatland conservation

In Datem del Marañón, there are three types of forests associated with peatlands. The largest are the aguajal forests, which account for about 80% of Amazonian peatlands, including the one found in Kietre Gonzales’s community.

Peat bogs are composed of layers of organic matter that have accumulated over decades, centuries or even millennia. This organic material never fully decomposes because it remains partially submerged in water. It becomes trapped within the ecosystem, says Aoife Bennet, a political ecologist at the University of Oxford, U.K., who has studied peat bogs in Peru.

Gabriel Hidalgo, a researcher with the Peruvian Amazon Research Institute (IIAP), part of Peru’s Ministry of the Environment, says water saturation is essential for peatland formation and for maintaining water supplies. “In other words,” he says, “during the dry season they act as a buffer, serving as a water reserve that is gradually released into small rivers and streams, which eventually flow into larger rivers. They are also a source — a storehouse of pure carbon.”

In 2022, Hidalgo and other scientists from IIAP and the Peruvian Trust Fund for National Parks and Protected Areas (Profonanpe) carried out a study that was published two years later. The goal was to establish a baseline of information on the condition of the forests and the carbon stock in the peatlands and aguajales of Datem del Marañón.

According to their findings, the vegetation within the peat bogs contains an average of 80 metric tons of carbon per hectare. In the peat soil itself, however, estimates reach up to 1,700 metric tons — 21 times more carbon than in the vegetation — highlighting the area’s immense importance. In other words, about 75% of the carbon stock in this region is stored in peatland soil. Moreover, peatlands can retain between three and five times more carbon dioxide per hectare than other tropical ecosystems.

However, when peatlands are degraded, they can become sources of carbon emissions. “If the temperature rises and moisture is lost, this organic matter begins to decompose more rapidly, releasing greenhouse gases — mainly CO₂ and methane,” Hidalgo says.

Gonzales, who also serves as vice president of the Association of Amazonian Fruit Producers of Recreo (ASPROFAR), learned this from the experts who visited his community. He recognizes the benefits that have come from caring for this ecosystem. For centuries, the abundance of aguaje in the communal territories has made harvesting its fruit one of the region’s main economic activities and a vital source of food.

From the early hours of the morning, between September and January, Gonzales and other members of the Recreo community enter the forest wearing rubber boots, equipped with new gear for climbing palm trees and raffia bags for harvesting aguaje. The days of cutting down the palms to harvest their fruit are long gone. Felling the aguaje trees meant they could never harvest from them again, so the community decided to change the way they worked.

While the men climb the palm trees, some secured by a harness system, the women shell the fruit that falls and fill up the sacks. Over the course of the season, they manage to collect an average of 80 sacks, earning 40 soles (about $12) for each one.

“Before, we used to harvest by cutting down the trees, but now we climb them,” says Segundo Chanchari, a climber from the native community of Puerto Díaz. “That means we no longer destroy them — we harvest from the palm trees while they’re still standing. That has been the biggest change in recent years.”

Scaling the aguaje palms, which can grow to heights of up to 30 meters (100 feet), has become quite an adventure for Chanchari. He’s been doing it for 16 years, and now, after learning new climbing and harvesting techniques, he travels to other communities to train others in these sustainable practices.

After a short walk from the cluster of wooden houses that make up the community, and with his tall rubber boots ready to wade through brush and local lagoons, Chanchari sets down his heavy backpack filled with work tools at the base of an aguaje palm. One by one, he begins fastening the ropes that will support him. Then he swaps his rubber boots for a pair fitted with spurs, preparing to climb toward the fruit high above.

“Aguaje is the lungs of the world — it absorbs carbon dioxide — and more and more people are realizing the importance of protecting the environment because of climate change,” Chanchari says, swatting away the mosquitoes that swarm around his sun-bronzed arms.

But it’s not all about extraction. Some clusters of aguaje fruit are deliberately left untouched to feed local wildlife, including the South American tapir (Tapirus terrestris), the lowland paca (Cuniculus paca), the gray brocket deer (Mazama gouazoubira), and monkeys such as the monk saki (Pithecia monachus) and the bald uakari (Cacajao calvus).

Scientists from IIAP and Profonanpe have been carrying out research in Datem del Marañón for the past seven years. In addition to developing a methodology for measuring carbon stock levels in peatlands, they also work hand in hand with Indigenous communities to conserve the ecosystem.

In 2015, the Green Climate Fund (GCF), a financial mechanism under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), approved funding for the project to improve wetland resilience in Datem del Marañón province. It was the first project in the world financed by the GCF.

Thanks to this initiative, local communities have strengthened their knowledge of how to use aguaje and peatlands sustainably.

Diversified actions to combat climate change

In the Puerto Industrial Native Community, an hour’s journey by river from Recreo, stands a solitary male aguaje palm. Its only companions are the heat and humidity. Only female aguaje palms bear the fruit needed to sustain life, yet both sexes depend on each other to survive. The lone palm here cannot pollinate any other.

Reaching skyward toward the vast blue expanse of the Amazon, this aguaje tree, growing beside a small fruit-processing plant, serves as a reminder to Felipe Gutiérrez of the territory’s fragility.

Working as a teacher in the Puerto Industrial community brought Gutiérrez into close contact with the forest. After living here for several years and helping to promote community development, he became increasingly interested in the aguaje production chain. Although there are aguaje plantations within Puerto Industrial’s territory, they’re far from the village, and harvesting the fruit calls for significant time and effort. As a result, the community has focused its work on processing fruit brought in from other villages, such as Recreo.

“Here in Puerto Industrial there are aguaje palms, but they’re very far away. It’s difficult to reach them because of the distance. In other communities, though, the fruit is right there,” Gutiérrez says at the processing plant, which now runs on solar power thanks to newly installed photovoltaic panels.

Since 2018, community members have come together through the Aguaje Producers and Management Association to process the sacks of fruit that arrive by river from 13 nearby communities. The aguaje production season is brief, so they make the most of every working day at the plant, where each person earns the equivalent of about $12 per day.

If she could go out to harvest aguaje herself, Llona Castillo says she would. “The wetlands are like quicksand — you can sink up to your knees,” says the 48-year-old mother of three. “Now we no longer work by cutting down the aguaje palms; we’re taking care of them instead.”

Lacking a stable job — and being a working mother, as Castillo describes herself — is one of the biggest challenges faced by women in Amazonian communities. “We need our daily bread, and this is how we earn a little money. Our quality of life has improved since aguaje production began. We make the most of it and get to work,” she says.

Today, the community processes this seasonal fruit in a plant they remodeled thanks to funding from the Green Climate Fund. Each season, they produce around 7,000 servings of aguaje ice cream, 20 liters (5.3 gallons) of aguaje oil, and 40 bars of aguaje soap. Castillo says she hopes to acquire more equipment to keep production going during the months when aguaje isn’t being harvested. The work going on in the community’s small factory complements other traditional sources of livelihood such as agriculture, hunting and fishing.

For other communities, such as those of the Kandozi ethnic group, artisanal fishing remains an ancestral practice that allows them to make use of the region’s aquatic resources. In the San Fernando community, aguaje harvesting isn’t an option — the trees lie too far from their territory.

Their greatest concern is the decline in fish populations, their main source of income, especially now that they have an ice plant that allows them to preserve their catch and transport it by river to urban markets, says Rider Gais, president of the Kachizpani Artisanal Fishermen’s Association, who has dedicated his entire life to fishing.

The lakes and rivers in the area are being affected by rising temperatures and sedimentation in the lagoons. To address this, local communities are turning to sustainable fishing practices, working to prevent peatland degradation and adapting to the effects of climate change, says Claudia Godfrey, director of innovation and strategic management at Profonanpe.

In addition, bio-businesses have become one of the main ways communities seek to create economic value while conserving natural resources and the surrounding ecosystems.

According to Godfrey, the project developed in the Marañón wetlands, which includes aquaculture, aguaje production and other activities, has two core objectives: conserving peatlands, and promoting the sustainable continuation of traditional livelihoods.

“Bio-businesses have a triple impact: they help conserve the ecosystem, improve people’s quality of life, and generate economic income,” Godfrey says, referring to the sites where these activities take place, which serve as buffer zones for the protection of peatlands.

The future of a fragile ecosystem

Conducting specialized studies in the peatlands of Datem del Marañón is no easy task. The journey is long, the logistics costly, and entry requires agreements with Indigenous communities. Yet, as a result of the scientific team’s 2022 expedition, researchers developed a new methodology for measuring carbon stock levels in peatlands — a document that will serve as the foundation for national peatland policy. This policy will be designed and managed by the National Forestry and Wildlife Service (SERFOR).

Crucially, the study differs from previous carbon stock assessments in that it distinguishes between the carbon stored in the peatlands and that in the standing forest.

“Not all trees have the same characteristics or store carbon in the same way. Including this variation is important to improve the accuracy of our estimates,” says Hidalgo, the IIAP researcher. “Understanding how much carbon is stored helps us better grasp climate change mitigation, because if that carbon were released into the atmosphere, it would affect regional and global climate patterns.”

In December 2024, José Nieto, SERFOR’s director, acknowledged the risks and illegal activities present in Datem del Marañón, including illegal mining, coca cultivation and deforestation. He also emphasized the importance of projects like those being developed in the area, which, he said, “show the right way to work with people.”

However, neither the Ministry of the Environment nor SERFOR responded to Mongabay Latam’s questions about the measures adopted based on the scientific team’s findings to inform peatland conservation policies.

Although there’s currently no monitoring system for these ecosystems at the national or regional levels, initiatives are underway to promote conservation during the implementation process. One such effort is the project “Guidelines for the Identification of Peatlands with the Aim of Adopting Measures for Their Registration, Conservation, and Sustainable Use in Peru.”

A recent study published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters shows that the Quistococha peatlands, in the neighboring province of Maynas, have lost their ability to capture carbon dioxide due to climate variations. The research was conducted by scientists from IIAP and the U.S.

“The fact that an ecosystem without significant human disturbance loses its essential ecological role solely because of climate change is alarming,” said Jeffrey Wood, lead author of the study and a researcher at the University of Missouri’s School of Natural Resources.

For the organic soils of the Datem del Marañón peatlands to maintain their carbon storage capacity, coordinated policies across different levels of government are essential for conservation and sustainable use, experts say. Without them, the efforts of scientists and Indigenous communities in the region could be in vain. As Bennet, the Oxford ecologist, notes, “it’s like having the eighth wonder of the world — you’ll want to protect it and be able to say you have it, so you can include it in your environmental commitments.”

 
Banner image: Segundo Chanchari climbs an aguaje palm tree using tools that allow him to protect it. Image by Leslie Moreno Custodio.

This story was first published here in Spanish on Sept. 9, 2025.

Citation:
Wood, J. D., Roman, D. T., Griffis, T. J., Cadillo‐Quiroz, H., Del Castillo, D., Fachin, L., … Wayson, C. (2025). A large Amazonian peatland carbon sink was eliminated by photoinhibition of photosynthesis and amplified ecosystem respiration. Geophysical Research Letters, 52(13). doi:10.1029/2025gl114642

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