NICARAGUA:
A Green Crusade for
Water
By
José Adán Silva
MANAGUA, Aug
(Tierramérica) - The
Nicaraguan government
launched a national
campaign to reforest
60,000 hectares per year
as part of an effort to
recover 18 rivers lost
as a result of
uncontrolled logging.
The National
Reforestation Campaign
was officially announced
in June and got under
way in July in several
municipalities of
Managua, largely along
the rivers and lakes
that have been polluted
by garbage and sewage
from the capital.
The annual reforestation
goal will last until
2012 and will involve
city governments,
primary and secondary
school students,
environmental
volunteers, and members
of Nicaragua's police
and military forces,
said William Schwartz,
director of the
government's national
forestry institute,
INAFOR.
More than 210 tree
species will be planted,
depending on the climate
and soil type of each
area, according to
INAFOR's municipal
development office. For
example, in the cooler
northern part of the
country, pines will be
planted, and, in the
warmer central region it
will be broad-leafed
trees.
This "green crusade"
will be carried out with
INAFOR's budget for this
year -- some eight
million dollars.
The plan has the backing
of President Daniel
Ortega and support from
the ministries of
agriculture and natural
resources, as well as
the Rural Development
Institute and the
National Assembly's
Environment Commission,
said Schwartz.
As of August, the number
of trees planted
surpassed 300,000 along
the Pacific coast and in
the central region,
according to the
Forestry Development
Office.
Mario García, a
technician with that
office, said the
priority areas are the
source areas of the 18
rivers that disappeared,
in the western
departments (provinces)
of León, Chinandega,
Matagalpa, Estelí and
Jinotega.
Forests play a crucial
role in recharging
rivers and lakes,
capturing rainwater and
filtering it to
underground water layers
and aquifers, which feed
the surface bodies of
water.
"Planting a tree simply
for the sake of planting
a tree is not beneficial
if it is not accompanied
by another purpose, such
as recuperating the
sources of water that
the Nicaraguan
population needs so
much," said García.
The official explained
that this campaign
encompasses another
goal: educating peasant
farmers, or campesinos,
and ranchers to change
their usual practice of
burning off forested
areas and to use more
sustainable methods to
irrigate their land.
Independent ecologist
Kamilo Lara told
Tierramérica that
although the crusade is
laudable, its success
will depend on the
government obtaining
support from the
country's 153 municipal
governments, 58 of which
are in the power of the
opposition Liberal
Constitutionalist Party.
"The municipal
governments are a good
hook for the campaign's
effectiveness, but if it
is not done directly
with the communities,
the campaign won't
produce the desired
results," commented
Lara.
According to Environment
Ministry data, in 1950,
forest covered
approximately eight
million hectares of
Nicaraguan territory.
Today, forested area has
fallen to three million
hectares, and continues
to decline.
The national
reforestation crusade
"is a race against
time," warns Schwartz.
Government statistics
state that nearly 70,000
hectares are deforested
illegally each year. "At
this rate, if we don't
find a way to halt this
activity, in 40 years
Nicaragua will have
turned into a desert,"
said the INAFOR
director.
President Ortega ordered
the army to step up
vigilance along highways
to and from the forested
regions, mainly the
protected areas of
Bosawa, in the north,
and the Indio Maíz
Biological Reserve, in
the south.
The president said that
traffickers in precious
wood operate in those
areas, cutting down the
trees and illegally
channelling it to
Honduras and Costa Rica.
In June 2006, the
government decreed the
Forestry Ban Act,
putting a 10-year
prohibition on selling
cedar (Cedrela odorata),
pochote (Bombacopsis
quinata), pine (Pinaceae),
mangrove (Rhizophoraceae)
and cockspur coral tree
(Erythrina crista-galli).
Natural resources
management expert
Guillermo Bendaña García
told Tierramérica that
Schwartz's grave warning
about the future "is not
extremist," adding,
"It's closer to reality
than we would imagine."
Bendaña, author of the
book "Global Ecological
Problems: The Beginning
of the End of the Human
Species?", said the pace
of environmental
destruction in Central
America could leave the
isthmus without
freshwater in less than
30 years.
An independent forestry
assessment conducted
between August 2006 and
March 2007 by the Global
Witness group, maintains
that Nicaragua is losing
between 70,000 and
180,000 hectares of
forest each year, and
with it, access to water
sources for human
consumption is
deteriorating.
The 2007 Human
Development Report,
presented in June by the
United Nations
Development Programme (UNDP),
says that more than 70
percent of Nicaragua's
5.1 million people lack
access to potable water.
(*Originally published
by Latin American
newspapers that are part
of the Tierramérica
network. Tierramérica is
a specialised news
service produced by IPS
with the backing of the
United Nations
Development Programme
and the United Nations
Environment Programme.) |
