YACHAY WASI

This project of Yachay Wasi in the Andean community of Acopia, the native village of Yachay Wasi President Luis Delgado Hurtado, is a long term major sustainable community development project involving other villages in the vicinity.

Dedicated primarily to instill cultural pride and interest in traditional arts to the children, the "Centro Cultural Yachay Wasi, runasimi" has evolved in a widescope project which includes other development goals of the Acopia community and will address various concerns: Education and culture, information and communication, health, habitat, environment, transportation and income generating business development.

This sustainable community development project based on cultural identity, incorporating traditional Indigenous knowledge and environmentally balanced technology, will benefit not only the children and parents, but the entire population of Acopia and neighboring villages.

The "Centro Cultural Yachay Wasi, runasimi" will include a theatre and art gallery, a library with Internet communication area, weaving room, ceramic room, music room, a health clinic, showers room, lunch cafeteria, kitchen, bedrooms for workshop attendees and a model habitat. Solar and wind power will be installed. The sustainability of the "CCYW, r" will be partially maintained through economical rotation, the ancient way of bartering... Income generating businesses such as llama and alpaca raising, fish farming and bottling of local geyser mineral water are being planned.

Primary language is runasimi (quechua). Spanish will be taught as secondary language and English as universal language.

In 2001, Yachay Wasi received a small grant from the United Nations Voluntary Fund for the International Decade of the World's Indigenous Peoples to implement the first phase of the project.

Additional funding was needed to continue with this project which is on hold.