Brazil Nuts
from Peru

The Peruvian state owns every Brazil nut tree and grants 40-year concessions that give a castañero the exclusive right to gather nuts across a defined stretch of standing forest. The concession system covers roughly one million hectares of closed-canopy Amazon in Madre de Dios, held by more than 1,000 concessionaires. Between 20 and 30 percent of the department's population draws income from the trade, so a harvest that keeps the forest intact is also the region's main rural economy.

The tree needs 20 to 30 years to bear fruit and depends on intact forest for its pollinators and for the agoutis that disperse its seeds, which is why commercial production stays wild. Harvest runs through the rainy season from December to March, when families move into forest camps, gather the fallen cocos, crack them, and carry the seeds out. Shelling plants in Puerto Maldonado then dry the nuts by vaporization and hand-peel the kernels, work that employs thousands of women paid by the kilo.