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Bolivian-German Development Cooperation in Protected Areas - Objectives, Activities and Impacts in Relation to the Millennium Development Goals
THE BOLIVIAN NATIONAL SYSTEM OF PROTECTED AREAS
Bolivia is one of the most biologically and culturally diverse countries in the world. Over the last ten years, its National System of Protected Areas has grown in size by more than 1000%. Today it covers about 20% of the country's territory; the 22 national protected areas alone have an extension of approximately 170,000 km² (equal to 15% of the country). More than 150,000 people live in the national protected areas, and they are economically and socially as well as ecologically related to about 100 municipalities with a population of more than two million. This situation is reflected in state norms and policies that focus on "protected areas with people", emphasising people's right to live permanently and improve their living conditions in these areas.
The National Protected Areas Service (Servicio Nacional de Areas Protegidas - SERNAP) is directly responsible for the management of the 22 national protected areas, and supervises the overall system, which comprises also departmental, municipal and private protected areas.
Management of the system in this context is increasingly focusing on the political, social and economic aspects of its sustainability. In practice, it aims to strengthen the link between the protected areas and development in municipalities and indigenous territories, increase social participation in the management and bring about economic benefits for the local population based on the sustainable use of biodiversity.
This approach requires the involvement of a large number of public institutions (sectoral ministries, prefectures and municipal governments) and civil society actors (social organisations and NGOs). Bolivia's protected areas receive technical and financial support from bilateral cooperation agencies (Germany, Netherlands, Denmark, Switzerland, the UK and the United States), multilateral agencies (GEF/World Bank) and international non-governmental organizations.
For channeling funds towards the protected areas the Bolivian-German development cooperation is contracting the services of a private foundation (Fundación para el Desarrollo del Sistema Nacional de Áreas Protegidas - FUNDESNAP), which administrates funds on behalf of SERNAP. This allows to minimize bureaucratic red tape. Assets can be transferred to local communities when projects end, which would be difficult for a government entity. Fund management is submitted to annual auditing.
GERMAN CONTRIBUTIONS TO BOLIVIA'S PROTECTED AREAS
KfW, the German institution for Financial Cooperation, is co-financing SERNAP's Biodiversity and Protected Area Program (Programa Biodiversidad y Áreas Protegidas - BIAP) with approximately 10,000,000 € (first phase 2003 to mid 2006 € 6,000,000, second phase planned for 2006 to 2009 with 4,000,000 €). BIAP supports six national parks and nature reserves: Madidi, Cotapata, Sajama, Tariquía, Eduardo Avaroa and Isiboro-Sécure. They represent Bolivia's most important ecosystems, from the high Andean region (e.g. Sajama) and the "Yungas" (e.g. Cotapata) to the Amazonian lowlands (e.g. Isiboro-Sécure). The central objective of BIAP is to contribute to the financial, environmental, social and institutional sustainability of protected areas. Its main activities are: generation of local benefits from conservation in ecological agricultural production, tourism and natural resources management; investments in infrastructure for conservation; land titling; strengthening social participation in protected areas management; and planning and monitoring support to park administrations. In parallel to the investments realized by BIAP, separate funds (about 3.500.000 €) generated through a bilateral debt-for-nature swap help to cover the operating expenses of protected areas.
The project "Management of Protected Areas and Buffer Zones" (Manejo de Áreas Protegidas y Zonas de Amortiguamiento - MAPZA) is implemented by SERNAP with support from GTZ, the German agency for Technical Cooperation. MAPZA supports the central SERNAP administration in the formulation of policy and legal frameworks as well as in the development of instruments for planning and administration. At the local level, in three protected areas (Sajama, Tariquía and Isiboro-Sécure), it concentrates on the integration of municipal and park planning and support to the development of community-based organizations. The total cost of MAPZA's three phases (1999 - 2009) is approximately 8.000.000 €. Several of its activities are co-financed through BIAP (for example, projects for the management of vicuña and tourism - the Tomarapi Lodge - in Sajama).
CIM is the human resources recruitment and placement organization for German development cooperation. At present. it finances two international experts who are integrated into the central SERNAP administration. One CIM tourism expert works on the implementation of an environmental tourism monitoring system, the development of legal frameworks and concepts for generating incomes for protected areas from entrance fees and other mechanisms, and supports community-based tourist projects (amongst others, those financed through BIAP). A second CIM expert has recently been incorporated into the central SERNAP administration for strengthening the planning department in its efforts to further integrate the management of Bolivia's protected areas into their local political and administrative environment.
The DED, created as the volunteer organization within German development cooperation, focuses on support to local organizations (e.g. farmer associations or indigenous organizations) and their networks by providing international experts and financing local professionals integrated into partner organizations. Concrete examples are the cooperation with BIAP in the Café Madidi Project, which is supported part-time by the DED expert attached to the Bolivian federation of small coffee producer associations (Federación de Caficultores Exportadores de Bolivia - FECAFEB) and the development of cacao-based agro-forestry systems with indigenous and settler communities in the northern buffer zone of the Madidi National Park. The latter project is supported by an international DED expert working with a local non-governmental organization.
EXAMPLES FOR ACTIVITIES
Infrastructure and equipment for conservation
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Bridge in the Sajama National Park
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One main investment area is infrastructures and equipments for the administration of protected areas, which enable the effective management of the vast and pristine territories. This component includes construction of offices and control posts as well as the provision of four-wheel vehicles, motorcycles, boats, computers, radios for communication and other small equipment. The BIAP program has financed park offices in Madidi (3), Cotapata, Tariquía and Sajama as well as more than 10 control posts in Madidi, Sajama, Isiboro-Sécure and Eduardo Avaroa. The funds generated through the bilateral debt-for-nature swap complement the investments by covering an important part of the salaries of park personnel and the operating expenses related to their control and monitoring activities.
BIAP also finances more socially oriented infrastructure, for example small bridges. These assure access to the areas and render it more secure for tourists. This aspect is important, for example, for people trekking on the Inca trail in the Cotapata National Park: The trail crosses various rivers that can rise rapidly and dangerously during the rainy season. At the same time bridges make life a lot easier for the local population (more safety for children going to school, quicker transport of animals and products, etc.). BIAP has supported the construction of seven bridges in Sajama, Cotapata and Tariquía.
During the first two years of BIAP, infrastructures and equipment for conservation constituted the major area of investment. Since the basic needs of the protected areas mentioned before have mostly been covered by now, this is to change significantly during the coming years in favor of other types of investments, especially in the generation of local benefits and land titling.
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Generation of Local Benefits from Conservation
With the creation of protected areas local population often experienced restrictions in their traditional use rights of natural resources while no alternative sources of income were offered. However, in line with the "Parks with People" concept of SERNAP - and Bolivian reality - the local population needs to develop a healthy self-interest in order to become a guardian of Bolivia's natural resources; otherwise it will remain or become one of the most important threats to its' existence. Thus, the creation of local benefits from conservation is a working area of rapidly increasing importance for German development cooperation. This need is reinforced by the fact that the rural communities in and near protected areas belong frequently to the poorest in Bolivia, not least because their location is typically remote from urban centers and modern transport facilities.
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The main project types in this field are
- ecologically oriented agricultural production projects (coffee in Madidi, honey in Tariquía, cacao in Isiboro-Sécure, etc.);
- use of natural resources by local communities based on plans for their sustainable management (vicuña for wool in Sajama, crocodiles for leather and meat in Isiboro-Sécure, etc.);
- community-based tourism projects (nature observation, trekking, rafting or fishing activities in Sajama, Cotapata, Madidi and Tariquía).
| Activities in the Sajama National Park (GTZ/MAPZA) and KfW/BIAP)
The Sajama National Park was the pilot area for German development cooperation in Bolivia's protected areas. Economic benefits were generated for the local population through traditional livestock farming, developing the area's tourism potential and economic use of a species of a wild camelid, the vicuña (vicugna vicugna). This use of resources is being made sustainable by building local capacities, based on producers' associations and community enterprises and in keeping with the social-organisational and ethnic characteristics of the Aymara people who live in the area. A park radio station was installed for reaching the rural communities related to the protected area, providing an essential means to facilitate widespread social participation.
Tomarapi Lodge is a community-based ecotourism enterprise providing an increasingly wide range of high quality services to Bolivian and foreign tourists. Through intensive support to social organization processes and training, the necessary administrative and management skills have been developed. Economic sustainability is guaranteed through the quality of the services provided to tourists.
The use of vicuña wool promises to generate a considerable amount of income and at the same time encourages the conservation of this species and the protected area by the local population. The process of implementing vicuña management built upon local organisational traditions. It is based on close cooperation between the communities in the protected area and the its buffer zone.
Initially, the protection of the vicuña as a consequence of the creation of the Sajama National Park was one of the main reasons why the local population, who considered the vicuña as competitors to their llamas and alpacas for pasture, rejected the protected area. Now, with the possibility to benefit from them in a sustainable manner, this perception has changed completely. In surveys of social acceptance, Sajama constantly shows a high degree of identification of people living in and around the area with what they now consider to be "their" park. |
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Rounding up vicuña for shearing in the Sajama National Park
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| The Café Madidi Project (KfW/BIAP and DED)
The Café Madidi project supports a local small coffee producer association composed of farmers living in villages inside and in the buffer zone of the Madidi National Park, which is possibly the most biologically diverse region of Bolivia. Project duration is three years (2004 to 2006). Project design was based on an existing local initiative and follows the "6 P" approach, meaning: that the relation to a protected area (or "park") shall help to promote the product, and that the product shall promote the park among its consumers. This connection is evident in the case of eco-tourism projects and can also be established in some agriculturally-oriented projects. In the Café Madidi case the (ecological) quality of the product and its origin of the coffee from a protected area and its buffer zone has helped the producers to forge a promising alliance with an up-market Bolivian coffee house chain, Alexander Coffee. Alexander promotes and sells the coffee under the label "Café Madidi". The "6 P" approach implies that wherever possible a preference will be given to identifying interesting national markets instead of going directly for exportation where the limited quantities available may not allow to position the products with their specific identity and where the potential for "communication" between producer and consumer in Bolivia will be lost.
The project budget is in the order of 400,000 USD of which 300.000 USD are financed through German development cooperation. With this size it becomes efficient to contract specialized staff for a temporary, decentralized project management unit that provides high quality services to the beneficiaries. The project is co-financed by the municipal government of Apolo, thus cultivating areas of joint interest between municipality and park administration. The project has a steering committee (project directory) comprising representatives from protected area administration, beneficiaries and other stakeholders, allowing to closely follow-up project progress and to take rapid decisions on strategy, budgets and activities by consensus. Every six months the directory evaluates the project and discusses its findings in an assembly with members of the producer association.
In order to achieve sustainable results within a relatively short period of project support the project team focuses on three main strategic areas:
- Organization: The producer association has to be socially balanced and in tune with a realistic business plan, matching the services to be provided to the monetary contributions needed from the individual members in order to cover the cost of service provision and vice versa. The organization has to manage "real" money as soon as possible. In a recent assembly the members of the association decided on some hefty contributions, showing a high degree of identification with their organization's affairs.
- Quality Management: The producers have to be totally convinced of the need to provide an ecologically sound high quality product and master completely the instruments needed in order to do so. Up to now, this has been achieved to a varying agree, mainly depending on the length of the membership of the individual villages in the producer association.
- Marketing: During project duration one or more strategic marketing alliances shall be developed (like this case the alliance with Alexander Coffee). On one hand, this helps to complement the often limited marketing competencies of a small farmer organization (e.g. difficulties to access international markets directly, lack of facilities for consumer-oriented product transformation and promotion). On the other hand, it can provide incentives in terms of higher prices paid and / or interesting medium- to long-term perspectives (e.g. the a possibility to gradually increase trade volume when certain standards are met in terms of quantities and qualities). However, the Café Madidi producer organization shall also gain knowledge about the whole range of marketing alternatives available in order to be able to react flexibly according to future developments (for example, when production grows or when a contract ends).
These elements can be summarized as the need to define, try out practically and firmly root in the collective as well as the individual new "traditions" ("the way we are doing things around here") that guarantee the sustainability of the organization. This implies intensive social processes based on constant analysis, open discussion and transparent decision making among the members of the local organization with support from the project staff and the project directory.
Already today the farmers organized in the association supported by the project receive significantly higher prices for their ecologically produced coffee, which directly translates into higher incomes and increased motivation. The municipal government, which before was opposed to the park, has now become an ally. Café Madidi is a pilot project and the insights gained during its implementation will help to further improve the design of future projects for the generation of local benefits. |
Land titling
Land tenure is a highly sensitive issue in Bolivia, where the existence of legal land titles is more an exception than the rule. Especially in protected areas, small land owners and traditional communities feel threatened because of the creation of protected areas. They tend to believe that one of the intentions behind their creation was to take their land away from them.
In order to overcome distrust, guarantee the use rights of the local population over their land and determine those unclaimed areas which remain state land, BIAP supports land titling or area demarcation in the six protected areas mentioned before. The characteristics of each process depends on the specific circumstances; however, in all cases they carried out in cooperation with the National Institute for Land Reform (Instituto Nacional de Reforma Agraria - INRA).
In the Isiboro-Sécure National Park, which is co-administrated by an indigenous organization, the task was to re-define the "red line" that separates indigenous land from settler communities which tend to continue expanding. This will later serve to establish a consolidated land title in favor of the indigenous population. Mixed teams have been constituted for defining the red line in a process of conciliation with a minimum of external support. Instead of creating conflict, which was initially considered to be a possibility, the process helped to improve the relation between indigenous and settler organizations, not least due to the negotiation competency of local leaders.
Another example is the land titling process in and around the Sajama National Park, which constitutes about 30% of the territory of the municipality Curahuara de Carangas. The initiative for land titling in this area came from SERNAP and was initially met by distrust and resistance from the local population. After almost two years of repeated presentations and discussions this situation has been overcome. By the end of 2004 it was decided with broad public support to undertake a joint effort by SERNAP and municipal government in order to cover the complete municipal territory. Evidently, this will enhance mutual integration of park and local administration. It will furthermore facilitate the later operation of the land cadastre, which falls into the responsibility of the municipal administration.
The kind of initial resistance from the local population to land titling observed in the Sajama case is typical, as well as the later, pronounced attitude change where local stakeholders become the most avid supporters of the process. Steering committees comprising representatives from all interested parties are created in order to supervise field work as well as legal procedures and to find solutions for the problems that inevitably emerge during such complex, long lasting (up to five years) and potentially conflictive processes.
About 25% of BIAP's investment budget are earmarked for land titling activities. Average cost per hectare is estimated at approximately 1 USD.
Social Participation in Area Management
Although their characteristics vary depending on the historical and ethnic context, the traditions of community social organisation in Bolivia provide a solid basis for participation by local stakeholders in the management of protected areas today. Likewise, the administrative reforms carried out in the country in the 1990s, which established popular participation as an essential component of sustainable development, have created a public policy framework that facilitates the intensification of social participation in many ways.
A part from the participation mechanisms mentioned before that are created for individual projects or processes of land titling, SERNAP is thus implementing a broader concept for stakeholder involvement in protected area management decisions. Most protected areas are supervised by Management Committees (Comités de Gestión) comprising representatives from villages, town councils, regional governments, universities, non-governmental organizations and SERNAP itself. These committees approve the protected area's annual planning and receive reports on the progress of activities. Meetings of the committees tend to be very lively events, often with controversial, but equally often with constructive discussions leading to better (i.e. more sustainable) decisions than any one party could make on its own.
SERNAP is proposing new forms of participation by local stakeholders that will gradually lead to spreading joint management models, where management responsibilities are transferred to political and social actors, for example, to indigenous organizations (like in the case of Isiboro-Sécure) or associations of local communities and towns. This proposal is received positively in more and more protected areas (for example, discussions about the future management of the protected area are now going on in Cotapata, Madidi and Tariquía). The process of strengthening the local stakeholders and developing the adequate model for the specific case is supported by BIAP and MAPZA through the organization of workshops, legal advice and training.
Planning
The main planning tools in Bolivia's protected areas are management plans and annual operative plans. Management plans, referring amongst others to the examples where their elaboration has been supported German development cooperation, are based on the analysis of present risks and potentials, have medium term time horizons (about five years), define management objectives and priority areas of action with their specific strategy guidelines. The process of elaborating a Management Plan itself can improve the acceptance of a protected area by the local population - if it is well done. It can show to the local population in a very practical way that its opinion counts. On the other hand, this kind of participatory planning can be a complex and lengthy process, where the planning team has to show high degrees of flexibility and stamina.
The long-term political, socio-economic and financial sustainability of Bolivia's protected areas will depend to a great extent on integrating them into the development strategies of the territorial administration bodies directly related to them and their buffer zones. About a third of all the country's municipalities overlap partly with protected areas. It is therefore important that they become aware of the economic and environmental potential of protected areas as well as the positive contribution they (can) make to their development. This awareness is then reflected in the inclusion of aspects relevant to protected areas' management in municipal development plans and the allocation of funds for carrying out production projects in protected areas.
A similar process is taking place with the indigenous territories (Tierras Comunitarias de Origen -TCOs) which overlap fully or partly with protected areas. Indigenous people are seeing the dual nature of the territory as an advantage for consolidating the TCO. This consolidation is being supported through the land titling process.
KfW is co-financing the elaboration of a medium term financial strategy for Bolivia's system of protected areas in order to compare needs and incomes (from national and international sources as well as income generated by the areas themselves), identify gaps and propose concepts for assuring financial sustainability. This strategy is presently being developed by FUNDESNAP, involving a wide range of stakeholders, for example, regional governments as well as the donor and NGO communities.
MAIN IMPACTS IN RELATION TO SELECTED MILLENNIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS
In September 2000, the General Assembly of the United Nations approved the United Nations Millennium Declaration. This declaration clarifies, on the basis of the values and principles of the United Nations, goals for peace, security and disarmament, development and poverty eradication, protection of our common environment, human rights, democracy and good governance, and protection of the vulnerable. The "Millennium Development Goals" have since become the basic orientation for all multilateral and bilateral development cooperation.
In the case of Bolivian-German development cooperation in protected areas the most relevant contributions towards reaching the Millennium Development Goals can be found in these fields:
- Eradication of extreme poverty and hunger
- Environmental sustainability
- Global partnership for development
- Good governance
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by: Lutz Horn-Haacke (GFA Consulting Group) and Jürgen Czervenka (GFA Consulting Group) with contributions from Nicole Häussler (CIM), Dirk Hoffmann (CIM) and Martin Jovanov (DED Bolivia)
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