Livelihoods, appropriate technologies, and their integration with urban development plans: the case of Nueva Ciudad de Belén, Loreto, Peru

• Main Authors: Belén Desmaison Estrada, Urphy Vásquez Baca, Kleber Espinoza Diaz
• Format: Article
• Language: Spanish
• Published: Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú 2018-08-01
• Series: Espacio y Desarrollo
• Subjects: Tecnologías apropiadas; reasentamiento poblacional; Amazonia; medios de vida
• Online Access: http://revistas.pucp.edu.pe/index.php/espacioydesarrollo/article/view/20183

The following article presents the current challenges for the sustainability of preventive resettlement projects, which are increasing in demand to the impacts of climate change in urban areas, proposing a better articulation between these and the urban development plans of cities, as well as a better integration with socio-economic development plans of local municipalities. These recommendations arise due to a recognition of the indispensable need for the social, environmental, and economic sustainability of this type of projects to be able to provide, at least, a quality of life equal to the previous one for the resettled population. To do this, resettlement projects must go beyond seeking to reduce the levels of physical vulnerability of the population and become programs of socio-economic development and appropriate technologies through the promotion of livelihoods that are compatible with the climate. This article describes the process of collective elaboration of a systemic proposal of sustainable livelihoods that sought to integrate municipal plans and pre-existing productive activities of the population in one of the most emblematic population resettlement cases in Peru: the relocation of 16,000 inhabitants of Belén to Nueva Ciudad de Belén in the Province of Maynas. For the elaboration of these proposals, the research team carried out a series of interdisciplinary academic courses that allowed a constant interaction between the academy, the local government, and the population.