Indigenous agroforestry in the Peruvian Amazon: Bora Indian management of swidden fallows

The purpose of this paper is to examine the swidden fallows of an Amazon native group, the Bora of eastern Peru, with the objective of demonstrating how fields are gradually abandoned. This contrasts with most studies of shifting cultivation which focus on why fields are abandoned, and which present a sharp distinction between the field (swidden) and the abandoned field (fallow). For the Bora there is no clear transition between swidden and fallow, but rather a continuum from a swidden dominated by cultivated plants to an old fallow composed entirely of natural vegetation. Thirty-five years or more may be required before the latter condition prevails. Abandonment is not a moment in time but rather a process over time. (author)