Forest Peoples Programme Supporting forest peoples’ rights

Expansion of Peru's Camisea gas project in the Peruvian Amazon

The Camisea project is already Peru’s biggest and most controversial hydrocarbons development, and now the government is promoting its expansion. A consortium headed by Argentine company Pluspetrol is planning to drill over 20 new wells and conduct intensive seismic tests in a concession called ‘Lot 88’ in the Camisea gas fields in the Amazon in south-east Peru, one of the most biodiverse regions in the world.

However, this region is home to indigenous peoples, some of whom are living in ‘voluntary isolation’ or in ‘initial contact’ with national society. Roughly three quarters of ‘Lot 88’ includes a reserve established to protect the lives and lands of these peoples by making it off-limits to extractive industries.

In addition, expansion is projected to involve a new concession, known as ‘Lot Fitzcarrald’, which not only includes further sections of the reserve but is slated to include parts of the renowned Manu National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

FPP is supporting indigenous organisations in Peru who are challenging the expansion of the Camisea project. This web page will feature up-to-date information about their efforts.

Relevant resources

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The IDB, Camisea and Peru: A sorry, sorry safeguards story

29 April, 2013

Gas pipeline construction in the Peruvian Amazon as part of the controversial Camisea gas project, partly funded by the IADB

The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) played a catalytic role in the development of the Camisea gas project in the Peruvian Amazon in 2002/2003 despite having no specific policy for projects impacting indigenous peoples. When the Bank adopted one in 2006, a key provision on isolated peoples was ignored when it made a US$400m loan the following year. Meanwhile, attempts by the Bank to ‘protect’ a reserve for indigenous peoples in ‘voluntary isolation’ directly impacted by the Camisea project have proven almost entirely ineffective and are now being further undermined by plans to expand operations within the Reserve. The IDB is required to approve these plans and could do so imminently.

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The UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (UNCERD) calls on the government of Peru to suspend plans to expand Camisea gas development in Kugapakori-Nahua-Nanti Reserve in South East Peru

18 March, 2013

Click here to read UNCERD's formal communication to the Permanent Mission of Peru (in Spanish only), which calls on the Peruvian government to suspend plans to expand the Camisea gas project in the Kugapakori-Nahua-Nanti Reserve for peoples in isolation and initial contact. 1 March 2013.

application/pdf iconLetter - Spanish (0.1 MB)

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International organisations request intervention of Peruvian President to prohibit expansion of Camisea gas project within Reserve for isolated indigenous peoples

1 March, 2013

On 22 February 2013, 58 international human rights and environmental organisations (including Friends of the Earth-France, the Sierra Club and Rainforest Foundation Norway) submitted a letter to President Ollanta Humala appealing for the prohibition of expansion plans of the Camisea gas project within the ‘Territorial Reserve for ethnic groups in voluntary isolation and initial contact, Kugapakori-Nahua-Nanti and others’ (KNN Reserve). These plans include proposals to carry out intensive seismic testing and build twenty-one wells, a flowline and associated infrastructure within ‘Lot 88’, and possibly establish a new concession, ‘Lot Fitzcarrald’, in the adjacent area.    

application/pdf iconLetter - English (0.4 MB)
application/pdf iconCarta - Español (1.6 MB)

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Request for Consideration of the Situation of the Indigenous Peoples living in Voluntary Isolation and Initial Contact in the Kugapakori Nahua Nanti Reserve in Peru under the UN CERD's Urgent Action and Early Warning Procedures. 25 January 2013

AIDESEP, ORAU, COMARU, Forest Peoples Programme

22 February, 2013

Indigenous peoples' organisations in Peru have appealed to the Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination (CERD), a UN human rights body, to prevent the expansion of the Camisea gas project within the Kugapakori-Nahua-Nanti Reserve because it could lead to the extermination of peoples living in isolation.

application/pdf iconRequest - English (1.4 MB)
application/pdf iconSolicitud - Castellano (1.6 MB)

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The Guardian: "Gas company targets protected Manú park in Peruvian Amazon"

20 February, 2013

Leaked document reveals Pluspetrol is eyeing a region where biodiversity 'exceeds that of any other place on Earth'

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The Guardian: "Peru's indigenous people take battle over gas exploration to court"

4 January, 2013

Campaigning groups say further expansion into Amazon territory could lead to 'extermination' of isolated tribes.

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The Ecologist: "Peru's Mysterious ‘Lot Fitzcarrald’ Threatens Uncontacted Tribes"

11 December, 2012

Peru is set to embark on a major expansion of gas operations in the Camisea region in the Amazon - a move which could decimate Indigenous peoples, both those in ‘voluntary isolation’ and others in the early stages of contact. 

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Indigenous organisations oppose Camisea expansion as Peru postpones decision to create new concession

10 December, 2012

An abandoned Mashco Piro campsite on a beach within the Nahua, Kugapakori, Nanti territorial reserve, Peru

On 2 November four Peruvian indigenous organisations issued a statement opposing recently-approved plans to expand operations in the Camisea gas fields[1] in the south-east of the country which would threaten the ‘physical and cultural survival’ of indigenous peoples in ‘voluntary isolation’ and initial contact. This expansion is scheduled to take place within the Kugapakori-Nahua-Nanti Reserve for isolated peoples which is supposed to be off-limits to extractive industries. However, earlier this year an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) for the first phase of expansion was approved by Peru’s Ministry of Energy and Mines, despite being challenged by the government’s indigenous affairs department , INDEPA, and questioned by indigenous organisations.

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UNESCO will urge Peruvian government to reconsider Camisea gas expansion plans that threaten the rights of isolated indigenous peoples and the integrity of Manu National Park

18 September, 2012

Five Indigenous People’s organisations (AIDESEP, FENAMAD, ORAU, COMARU and ORPIO) have written a letter to the UN Special Rapporteurs for food, adequate shelter and on the rights of indigenous peoples requesting that they urge the Peruvian government to cancel its imminent plans to expand oil and gas development within the Territorial Reserve in favour of the Kugapakori, Nahua, Nanti and other ethnic groups in voluntary isolation or initial contact in South Ea

application/pdf iconLetter - English (0.2 MB)
application/pdf iconCarta - Español (1.1 MB)

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Peruvian government on brink of expanding oil and gas development in reserve for isolated peoples and UNESCO world heritage site

23 July, 2012

House of an isolated Machiguenga family in the Nahua/Kugapakori Reserve & area of proposed expansion of the Camisea gas project

The Peruvian government has recently approved expansion plans for the Camisea gas project in the heart of a Reserve for isolated indigenous peoples and is considering gazetting a further concession that could overlay Manu National Park, a UNESCO world heritage site. These decisions threaten the lives and rights of its inhabitants and represent an infringement of both international law and Peruvian domestic legislation.

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