Covering roughly 8 million hectares, Tambopata province in Peru is considered one of the country’s most biodiverse regions. Although more than half of the region is formally protected, the landscape has long been shaped by human settlement and economic activity. Deforestation driven by extractive industries remains the main threat, historically from logging and forest management, combined with agricultural expansion, and increasingly from alluvial gold mining, all of which contribute to forest loss and significant ecosystem degradation.

In this scenario, Miguel Saraiva, the Director of the Wyss Academy's Hub South America is clear from the start: the work carried by him and his team does not begin with ideals, but with reality. “What we try to demonstrate,” he explains, “is that it is possible, with knowledge and targeted interventions, to transform a relationship of conflict between society and nature into one where both can win — where we can conserve nature while also guaranteeing people’s well-being.”

Mining, Saravia argues, cannot be treated as a marginal issue in Madre de Dios. “Nearly 70% of the population is directly or indirectly linked to alluvial mining,” he explains, whether formal, informal, or illegal. “If 70% of people depend on it in some way, we have to understand the role mining plays in the forest and in people’s lives.” 

This dependency complicates the picture. Mining generates environmental harm, but it also provides income in a region with limited alternatives. “It creates problems for nature, but also for people — through unsafe working conditions and contamination from mineral processing,” Saravia says. The challenge, then, is not whether mining should exist, but how it is carried out. 

“Mining in Madre de Dios is not going to stop,” he states plainly. “What we have to guarantee is that it is done formally, respecting the limits society has established.” 

A recurring theme in Saravia’s thinking is listening — particularly to miners themselves. “Part of our work is understanding what miners think about their activity,” he says, “what their future aspirations are, and how external interventions can help them achieve those aspirations while committing to conservation.” 

This perspective challenges a dominant narrative in which miners are treated as obstacles rather than actors. “In an environment where mining has only been criminalized,” Saravia explains, “it becomes very difficult to approach the issue seriously.” 

He is careful not to romanticize the sector. While criminal activity often intersects with gold mining, he emphasizes that many workers and miners are committed to doing things responsibly. “There are miners who want to do it right,” he says. “That’s where the seed of change lies.”

One of the most striking insights Saravia shares concerns formalization. “Formal miners have made an enormous effort to become formal,” he says. “They are neighbors, members of the community, people whose income contributes to the city and the region.” 

Yet many find themselves stuck. “Those who are trying to associate and connect to legal value chains are not finding alternatives,” Saravia explains. Instead, existing systems often reward illegality and discourage compliance, leading formal miners to question whether formalization is worth the effort. 

“Formalization doesn’t fail because miners don’t want it,” his words suggest, “but because the system around them doesn’t respond.” 

For Saravia, research conducted on the topic of gold mining is not about producing reports that stay in isolation. “The first step is to generate evidence about what is really happening,” he says. “The second is to share that evidence with key actors and start building solutions together.” 

This collaborative approach is essential because mining is not disappearing. “If we do nothing,” Saravia warns, “we become complicit in the continued damage to nature and to people’s lives.” 

Despite all the challenges, Saraiva remains hopeful. Madre de Dios still has “95% of its territory in good conservation status,” he notes, which creates an opportunity to prevent further damage — if action is taken now.