The influential lifestyle magazine TRAVEL+LEISURE (American Express Group) announced its 2019 World’s Best Award Winners. Inkaterra is named as third best in the ‘World’s Best Hotel Brands’, a selection of the 25 outstanding companies in the hospitality industry.

“It is truly an honor to be part of the only Peruvian brand among the world’s 25 best, according to Travel+Leisure’ readers,” stated Inkaterra founder and CEO José Koechlin. “We are so grateful with our travelers’ invaluable support, who acknowledge four decades of teamwork, resilience and perseverance to share Peru’s cultural richness and natural diversity with the entire world”.

Established in 1975, Inkaterra pioneered ecotourism and sustainable development in Peru. Through its holistic approach, the brand produces scientific research as a basis for biodiversity conservation, education and the wellbeing of local communities in the Amazon rainforest of Madre de Dios, the Machu Picchu cloud forest, the Sacred Valley of the Incas, the city of Cusco and the Tropical Sea, coast and dry desert of Cabo Blanco in Northern Peru.

Celebrated for its hotels’ artisanal design, inspired by native architecture and built with local materials in harmony with the environment, Inkaterra caters to more than 200,000 travelers every year. The brand is member of various alliances, including Relais & Châteaux, Virtuoso and National Geographic Unique Lodges of the World.

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MACHU PICCHU DECLARED
FIRST SUSTAINABLE WONDER OF THE WORLD

On July 7, celebrating the 12th Anniversary of the election for the New 7 Wonders of the World, the Municipality of Machu Picchu declared the Historic Sanctuary as First Sustainable Wonder. The announcement was possible due to ONG Inkaterra Asociación, whose alliance with AJE Group and the Machu Picchu Town Hall allowed an innovative strategy to turn Machu Picchu into the first city in Peru and Latin America that sustainably manages most of its solid waste, in benefit of its cultural and natural heritage.

“Our Wonder of the World is now perceived as a sustainable destination and is a successful case study for global ecotourism,” declared Dr. Darwin Baca, Mayor of Machu Picchu. The ‘Machu Picchu: First Sustainable Wonder’ campaign started in 2016 after UNESCO warned the inclusion of the Inca Citadel in its Patrimony at Risk list due to a waste management crisis. Inkaterra Asociación and AJE Group solved this serious threat with the donation of a PET compacting machine to process 7 tons of plastic waste on a daily basis. Additionally, a biodiesel production machine was established to turn used cooking oil into biodiesel and organic glycerin, as well as an organic waste processing plant uses pyrolysis (decomposition through high temperatures) to produce bio-char, a nutrient-rich soil amendment for reforestation and highland agriculture.

Inkaterra is also actively encouraging its guests and online communities towards a life without plastic. As 9 million tons of plastic waste end up in the ocean every year, single-use plastics have become one of the most serious environmental issues. In addition to conservation workshops for local schoolchildren and cleanup campaigns in areas of influence, Inkaterra properties are committed to green operations that include reusable glass bottles in rooms, water dispensers and a refillable stainless steel water bottle given to each guest as souvenir for in-house activities and excursions.

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INKATERRA JOINS
‘TAMBOPATA LIBRE’ CAMPAIGN

Inkaterra is sponsoring a joint effort to promote the sustainable use of natural resources through ecotourism and other activities beneficial to both nature and local economy. In alliance with the Peruvian Society for Environmental Law (SPDA), Inkaterra is supporting the ‘Tambopata Libre’ initiative led by the Tambopatas, a group of local volunteers whose main goal is to protect the buffer zone of Tambopata National Reserve from illegal mining and logging.

Led by environmental activists Isabel Yalico and Víctor Zambrano (winner of the 2016 National Geographic Leadership in Conservation Award), ‘Tambopata Libre’ aims to raise awareness on the conservation of Madre de Dios, privileged with one of the highest biodiversity rates in the world. Tambopata National Reserve is home to local communities and various ecosystems inhabited by endangered species such as giant river otters, jaguarondis, anteaters, pumas and margays. Nonetheless, 9200 hectares of rainforest disappeared in 2018 due to illegal mining.

STELIS MACHUPICCHUENSIS:
NEW ORCHID SPECIES FROM MACHU PICCHU

Inkaterra Asociación’s orchid specialist, Dr. Benjamín Collantes, in collaboration with Carlos Martel (Ulm University, Germany), authored the description of Stelis Machupicchuensis, named in honor of its place of origin and published in BioOne Complete database as a new species to science from Southeastern Peru.

This species belongs to Stelis Sw., a highly diverse Neotropical genus of Orchidaceae (900-1100 species distributed from Mexico to Brazil, with its greatest diversity found in the Andes mountain range) and is part of the subtribe Pleurothallidinae. A short column surrounded by remarkably short petals, with a lip denominated “central apparatus,” characterize this species.

The description of Stelis Machupicchuensis confirms the astonishing floral diversity native to the Andean cloud forest, where Inkaterra Asociación conserves the world’s largest native orchid collection with 372 species. Our botanists will speak at the VI Andean Orchid Scientific Conference, celebrated from August 6-8 at EAFIT University (Medellin, Colombia).

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NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE MO YAN,
SPECIAL GUEST AT INKATERRA

Chinese novelist Mo Yan, 2012 Nobel Laureate for his epic work that “with hallucinatory realism merges folk tales, history and the contemporary,” was one of the main speakers at the 2019 Lima International Book Fair.

Sponsored by Inkaterra, the country’s main cultural event allowed Mo Yan’s first-ever visit to the Peruvian Andes, hosted by three Inkaterra properties in the Cusco region. A journey through the capital of the Inca empire, iconic sites in the Sacred Valley and Machu Picchu, where Mo Yan and his family were guided by Dr. José Bastante, director of the Historic Sanctuary.

Influenced by William Faulkner, Mo Yan was considered by TIME magazine as “one of the most famous, oft-banned and widely pirated of all Chinese writers”, whose fiction echoes Franz Kafka and Gabriel García Márquez’s magical realism to portray modern Chinese history.

THE TELEGRAPH NAMES INKATERRA LA CASONA
ONE OF THE WORLD’S 50 GREATEST HOTELS

UK newspaper The Telegraph voted the 50 Greatest Hotels in the World, with Inkaterra La Casona (Best Hotel in South America and world’s fourth best according to Travel+Leisure’s 2018 World’s Best Awards) among selected properties, rated in terms of location, service, style, soul, design, seclusion, facilities or romance. “La Casona, on a beautiful plaza in the San Blas district, is thought to be the oldest colonial building in the city and was briefly the home of liberator Simón Bolívar. Carefully restored before opening in 2008 – it became Peru’s first Relais & Châteaux hotel a year later – it still feels like a conquistador’s private residence… Eleven sumptuous and spacious suites overlook the plaza or inner courtyards, and all have private dining spaces as well as stone fireplaces, heated wooden floors and marble bathrooms,” the expert reviews, celebrating the ecclesiastical calm of Yacu spa, the gastronomy and the courteous staff.

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