RONAP - Recolectores Organicos de Nuez Amazonica del Peru

RONAP was created in April 2003, by individual brazil nut gatherers in the Madre de Dios province of Peru. The impetus came from Candela through their organic project, who have provided guidance for them in developing their Fairtrade and Organic market. It is through their strategic alliance with Candela that we are able to bring you our delicious Amazon Flame Brazil Nuts.

Today there are 62 members of RONAP in five distinct regions: Bajo Madre, Lago Valencia, Rio Piedras, Carretera 1 and Carretera 2. These regions are separated by considerable distances from each other due to the limited transportation links in the area.The Board of RONAP is formed of 5 members, one from each region.

Mission

• Being able to offer larger volumes of a high quality product whilst ensuring the protection of the environment.
• Working to improve their economic returns in order to contribute to the improvement of the quality of life of their families and workers.
• The members of their organisation share the values of honesty and responsibility in their work. Their customs are participative and democratic and they honour with transparency their relationships, alliances and commitments with others.

Forest Harvest

Brazil nuts (sometimes called Amazon nuts) grow wild throughout the rain forests of the Amazon. Each ripe pod contains many brazils arranged like the segments of an orange. They drop to the floor of the forest during the rainy season (January to March) from trees that are 50 meters high.

The huge 70kg bags are filled deep in the forest and then transported by boat or on the gatherer’s backs to the shelling and drying factory. Nut gathering is a traditional family activity where each group leaves the town for several months and lives in the forest collecting and transporting the nuts. This income provides local people with a real alternative to clearing rainforest for agriculture.

Brazil nuts have a special place in conservation terms because unlike most other nuts that are commercially available in the west, they are harvested in the wild.

Attempts to grow them in plantations have been unsuccessful because the trees are an inextricable part of the rainforest ecosystem. They are pollinated by specialised bees, with long tongues to reach into the flowers, and there is even a species of frog which breeds only in the pools that collect inside the discarded pods.