Ruthmery Pillco is a Peruvian biologist who works on conservation and biodiversity projects in the rainforests of Costa Rica and Peru. In Costa Rica, she has led conservation projects for rare and threatened trees on the Osa Peninsula, conducting inventories of flora and germinating threatened trees for use in restoration projects. Ruthmery is an Indigenous Peruvian biologist from a village outside of Cusco, and is a trilingual speaker of Spanish, English and Quechua.

As a member of the IUCN Group of Tree Specialists, she has collaborated with the Global Tree Campaign to assess the IUCN conservation status of endemic trees on the Osa Peninsula. In Peru, she leads an Andean bear conservation program for the nonprofit organization Conservación Amazónica-ACCA in the Peruvian Andes of Manú National Park, where she and her team use different conservation technologies to understand the secret life of Andean bears. She received her Master’s degree in plant and fungi taxonomy, conservation, and biodiversity from Queen Mary University of London and Kew Gardens.