| Cayambe Kayampi |
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| — Municipality — | |
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Cayambe
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| Coordinates: | |
| County | Ecuador |
| Province | Pichincha |
| Canton | Cayambe |
| Legal creation | July 23, 1883 |
| Urban parishes |
List
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| Population (INEC census 2001-01-25) | |
| • Total | 30,473 |
| Decadal national census by the Instituto Nacional de Estadística y Censos (INEC) | |
| Time zone | ECT (UTC-5) |
| Website | http://www.municipiocayambe.gov.ec |
Cayambe is an agricultural service town (population 30,473 at the last census on November 25, 2001) in highland Ecuador. It lies at the foot of the Cayambe volcano. While the town is mainly peopled by mestizos, the surrounding rural population is primarily composed of indigenous people who are mainly involved in subsistence agriculture, dairy farming and procurement of lumber.
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Cayambe's indigenous people of today are descendants of the pre-Inca Kayambi people. The Kayambi were resistant to Inca expansion and were only definitively conquered by Huayna Capac (the eleventh Sapa Inca of the Inca Empire) after a bloody 20-year war. At that time, the Kayambi people adopted the Kichwa language, a dialect of the Quechua family of languages. Not long afterwards, in the 16th century, the first Spanish conquistadores arrived in the region. Kichwa survives in some of the hamlets today, while in others it has given way to Spanish.
The town of Cayambe is the seat of the canton of Cayambe.
The area hosts numerous flower plantations whose products are destined for the overseas cut flower market. Toxic inputs and unsafe practices associated with these plantations have damaged the local environment and created health problems among the workers, including forms of cancer. Among the local food products, better known are cheese and biscochos de Cayambe (a crumbly biscuit).
There is a globe monument, the Mitad del Mundo, in the spot where the road to Cayambe from Quito (the Pan-American Highway) crosses the equator. There is also other monuments to the Equator in Cayambe, including the Quitsato Reloj, a sundial.
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