Traditional knowledge in a changing world – new insights from the Chacobo in Bolivia

The Chacobo are a Panoan speaking tribe of about 500 members in Beni, Bolivia. Originally nomadic, the Chabo were relocated in their current main location in the 1960s, after American missionaries convinced the Bolivian government to set up a homeland for the tribe, and migration ceased. The first large ethnobotanical study on the tribe was conducted by Brian Boom in the 1980s.

During the last decade, the status of indigenous groups in Bolivia has markedly improved, and the Chacobo now have legal title to a territory of about 450,000ha. Our present work represents the start of a follow up ethnobotanical inventory of the tribe. The departure of permanent missionaries, access to markets, with an all weather road constructed in the last few years, as well as a larger territory, seem to already have markedly changed plant use and knowledge patterns and lifestyle of the population. All children now learn Chacobo as their first language in school, the use of important plant species centers more on income generation, and the more sedentary lifestyle of the tribe is again replaced by migration patterns, based on seasonal availability of resources.