Tarcila Rivera Zea is Director of Chirapaq and  Member of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. She is a leader in the movement of indigenous women of the Americas. Tarcila is a Quechuan activist from Ayacucho, Peru who has devoted over 30 years of her life to defend and seek recognition and acknowledgment of indigenous peoples' rights and cultures.
Her contributions have resulted in the creation of the Permanent Workshop of Andean and Amazonian Indigenous Women of Peru, the International Indigenous Women's Forum (FIMI) and the Continental Network of Indigenous Women of the Americas (ECMIA). She has served as a resource person to the NGO Committee on Indigenous Rights, and has participated in forums in Nairobi, Cairo, Beijing, Durban and in the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Peoples. As a child Ms. Rivera Zea became a domestic worker in exchange for education, learning Spanish only at age 18. She founded Chirapaq in 1985, initially to help Quechua children in the context of political violence. She has led Chirapaq to become a leading agency for the rights of indigenous women