12:15 – 14:30 Field visit in the Junin and Lima Region, in the Peruvian Andes, with H.E. Mr. Ollanta Humala, President of Peru, and H.E. Ms. Nadine Heredia Humala, First Lady of Peru [With Mrs. BAN] aborted mid journey
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Each time I return to my village, the mountains that define my world seem ever more naked, shorn of the mantle of white that once covered them completely. The snow thaws earlier in the year, and returns later, if at all.

As world leaders prepare to travel to Paris to negotiate a solution to climate change, our shrinking snow cover should concern them, not only for what it means to me and to other indigenous Andeans, but for what will be lost to the world, as the glaciers recede.

Indigenous communities in the Andes have been adapting our crops and way of life to the changing climate for 8,000 years. We guard more than 3,000 varieties of potato, for example, a treasure of biodiversity that helps to protect French frites and British chips from the sort of pathogen that caused the famine in Ireland in the 1840s.

The indigenous peoples of Latin America are already on the front lines of climate change.

We plant our crops on terraces to better manage water use and soil and to take advantage of natural fertilizers, allowing us to counter the effects of climate change. And in the Amazon, indigenous Amazonians have long been living sustainably in the rainforest, guarding great stores of carbon and outperforming all other managers of forests, public or private.

Yet there is no role for indigenous peoples woven into the preparatory documents for COP 21 negotiations.

The text mentions the need for transparency and for “equitable sharing” of benefits. And negotiators appear to embrace actions that will mitigate climate change and help countries adapt to it. But there is no mention that might give us leverage in negotiating with our governments, many of which are responsible for the concessions that cover our traditional lands in the Amazon and the Andes with mining and logging operations, and now threaten to decimate our forests in favor of palm oil plantations.

The indigenous peoples of Latin America are already on the front lines of climate change.

Our farmers are following the cold weather up the mountain, but there is only so far they can go before the land will become entirely inhospitable to the potato, even the most resilient varieties.

In my village, melting snow and water from plentiful rains once allowed us to use our ancestral knowledge to conserve enough water to feed our animals and irrigate our crops through the dry season.

But those days are gone. We no longer have enough water to nourish the potatoes, quinoa and cassava plants that feed our people.

Our leaders should know that we will be watching; their decisions will matter to so many-

But those days are gone. We no longer have enough water to nourish the potatoes, quinoa and cassava plants that feed our people.

So this week, my colleagues and I from the mountains and rainforests of Latin America will travel to Paris to bear witness to the threats that put at risk our resources, as well as the traditional knowledge we have about how to manage them.

We will come as members of the International Forum of Indigenous Peoples on Climate Change (IIPFCC). Funded by the Government of Norway and in partnership with the United Nations Development Programme, the IIPFCC has succeeded in obtaining important commitments from governments to respond to the needs of indigenous peoples and to ensure that our rights and resources are protected.

Our leaders should know that we will be watching; their decisions will matter to so many-whether the water-starved residents of Sao Paulo, or the Andean farmers who are making their way up the mountain in search of a safe place to plant their precious potatoes.

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