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Good practice Imported

Waru Waru Raised-Field Rehabilitation, Lake Titicaca Basin, Peru

Peru · Puno · See the Peru profile

Evidence: Quasi-experimental Top 89% 27/100 · Ask Evidence Copilot about this practice

Peruvian farmers around Lake Titicaca are rebuilding pre-Hispanic waru waru raised fields, which use surrounding water channels to buffer crops against frost; a 1980s reconstruction programme restored 229 of a planned 500 hectares, with mixed results.

1 °C
Temperature increase over flat fields
82,000 hectares
Historic waru waru extent (altiplano)
229 hectares
Hectares converted (1980s reconstruction programme) (1982-1989)
500 hectares
Programme hectare target (1982-1989)
Waru Waru Raised-Field Rehabilitation, Lake Titicaca Basin, Peru

Details

Promoter
Instituto Nacional de Investigación Agropecuaria y Agroindustrial (INIAA), CIAS, CEPIA and local NGOs
Period
technique dated to ~300 BCE; reconstruction programme 1982-1989, revival continuing to present
Keywords
agriculture, water management, climate adaptation, cultural heritage

Context

Around Lake Titicaca, pre-Hispanic farmers built waru waru — raised planting beds separated by water-filled channels — dating to around 300 BCE, once covering an estimated 82,000 hectares across the Peru-Bolivia altiplano before falling out of use.

Objectives

Between 1982 and 1989, Peruvian agricultural research institutions (INIAA, CIAS, CEPIA) and NGOs ran a reconstruction programme around Puno aiming to rebuild 500 hectares of waru waru across 72 rural communities, to reduce frost damage to potato and quinoa crops using the beds' water-buffered warmth.

Results

The surrounding water keeps growing beds roughly 1°C warmer than nearby flat fields; by the end of the 1982-1989 programme, 229 of the targeted 500 hectares had been converted, with mixed productivity results — some plots saw large gains, particularly for potatoes, while others did not.

Conclusions

No source reviewed gives a specific present-day yield increase, current hectare count under cultivation, or named current funding body — the strongest quantified evidence concerns the thermal/frost-buffering mechanism and the 1980s programme's scale, not present-day productivity.

Implementation
Indicative cost
Low (< €50k)
Time to results
Long (> 3 years) — Reconstruction programme ran 1982-1989 (7 years); revival by communities continuing to present.
Staffing & skills
Peruvian agricultural research institutions (INIAA, CIAS, CEPIA) and local NGOs coordinating reconstruction, Rural communities (e.g. Acora, Huatta, Coata) maintaining fields

Conditions for success

  • Community labour to rebuild and maintain raised beds and channels
  • Sustained community adoption in some communities beyond programme end

Common failure modes

  • Mixed productivity results across converted plots
  • Programme achieved only 229 of 500 targeted hectares

Commonly funded by

National / regional programmes Philanthropic / foundation funding

Indicative funding routes for practices of this type — always check each programme's current calls and eligibility rules.

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Data sources

Where this practice's information was retrieved from, and when.

Attachments

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