The ties among the people that have virtually developed the Colectivo Mama Coca owe their first start to the cooperation of academics from the Instituto de Estudios Políticos y Relaciones Internacionales (IEPRI) de la Universidad Nacional de Colombia and to professors, such as Jaime Caycedo and Jairo Estrada and others from this same university. To journalist Ricardo Ávila's down-to-earth approach and researcher Margarita Serje's alternative outlook and Aura Mar[ia Puyana's knowledgeable advice on aerial spraying issues. To the generosity of those who have sent in their studies for this and later publications; to Professors  Bruce Bagley, Charles Bergquist and other academics from the US, Canada and France. To the timely response of Professor Pierre Salama and Alain Labrousse, founder of the former OGD and researcher Molly Charles from India. To the open-minded possibilities offered by France, a crossroads of multiple influences, and to the Institute des Hautes Études de l'Amérique Latine (IHEAL) and its contribution to a pluridisciplinary approach of Latin America's issues. To Jean-Michel Blanquer, former director of the Paris Institute for Higher Latin American Studies. To our Bolivian colleagues Dionicio Nuñez and Nelson Carvajal. To Mama Coca Friends, our dear Peruvian colleagues Baldomero Cáceres, Nancy Obregón Peralta y Hugo Cabieses. To dedicated researchers such as María Clemencia Ramírez, Bernardo Pérez Salazar y Henry Salgado Ruíz. To Elsa Nivia (Rapalmira), Yeremy Bigwood, Yamile Salinas and Astrid Puentes and their advocacy and exhaustive research on fumigation. To the path to peace opened by Anthony Henman, Jaime Zuluaga, Camilo González Posso, and European and US scholars and activists through their studies, experience and alternative proposals. To the valuable contribution made by the Illicit Crops Network of the Universidad de los Andes and technical support of Andrés A. Medina and t To the active logistic cooperation of Natalia Zuluaga, Juan David Moreno, Daniel Feder and Laura del Castillo and Sara De Haro and José Yesid Sabogal of Mama Coca France.   We owe our chance to expand our outreach to the Tides Foundation.

MamaCoca's Projects

Mama Coca began its search for concrete alternatives together with the indigenous Proyecto Nasa Esh’s for the socialization of the coca leaf. Coca tea producción and sales have benefitted the Nasa Indian People, he Cabildo de Calderas and have helped to educate people regarding the nutritional virtues of the coca leaf.  Nasa Esh’s is currently producing coca cookies and the nutritious coca soft drink, a blend of indigenous and Western taste. Others in Colombia who have followed this example is the indigenous peoples' alliance  which produces the Kokasana tea.   MamaCoca's long term goal is to contribute to finding support for the region's peasant communities in their search for the economic, social and political empowerment needed to avoid the war being forced on them and shelter themselves from the economic and armed persecution to which they have been hstorically subjected.  To this end, Mama Coca, together with her allies, has conscientously laid the foundations of concrete and feasible projects with long-term goals: 

• Independent Global Commision ) founded on June 18th, 2003 at the Mama Coca Workshop under the “Crops Issue” on occasion of the Thematic World Social Forum in Cartagena. It comprises 50 well-known experts and social leaders from 16 different countries and all scopes of knowledge on the ‘drug’ issue.  The basic criteria adopted for the Commission is the defense of Human Rights and civil liberties of growers and users. In this sense, one of the goals is to launch a horizontal social debate regarding the criminalization of peasant and small-crop growers of coca, cannabis and poppy and the conditions and measures affecting users. Its first role would be to submit a draft of a new document incorporating the original proposal and the different views put forward by the members of Impulse Committee for feedback towards building the Independent Global Commission. The members of the Coordinating Team come from different countries, −France, Brazil, Colombia, Pakistan, Cuba, Italy, Spain, India, Peru, and the United States− and scopes: Alain Labrousse; Ana Maria Motta; Henry Salgado from the Cinep; Ecofondo (represented by Elsa Nivia and Rafael Colmenares); Iqbal Khan; Jorge Atilio Silva; Luis Suárez Salazar; Luiz Paulo Guanabara; Mama Coca (represented by María Mercedes Moreno and Darío González Posso); Marco Perduca; Martín Barriuso; Molly Charles; Ricardo Soberón; and Sharda Sekaran.

• Coca Bill: A Bill proposed in 2003 which clearly outlines the distinction between Coca, the natural resource (the plant), and cocaíne, the chemical substance into which Coca can be processed.

• Andean Amazon Forum:  An international forum which brought together the Andean Amazón Region's indigenous, peasant and social leaders with European and USA academics and activists.

• Reforma Red Latinoamericana pro la reforma de políticas de drogas; promoviendo reformas legislativas (Ley de Coca) e impulsando la elaboración de productos de coca.  

• The Coca Paper is a sustainable, profitable and Human Rights-abiding formula for eliminating the dependency of Colombian peasants on growing coca-for-cocaine for a living. This productive project is proposed as a manual/mechanical, voluntary, mass and permanent eradication formula for the extensive coca currently grown for illicit purposes.  

MamaCoca encompasses all of us  Mama Coca 

We would like to thank the Tides Foundation for having made it possible for us to launch this  advocacy for social inclusion.