The Chocó-Manabí Corridor encompasses some of the most biologically rich and diverse habitats in the world. Ranging from the Pacific coastal waters and mangrove forests to the peaks of the western
cordilleras of the Andes, and from the wetlands of northwestern Colombia to the dry forests of southern Ecuador, the region is also home to a unique set of cultures. Each of these groups lives within, and makes different uses of, the habitats, natural resources, and geographic properties of its respective homeland. Each group has a different legal and corporate status under the national constitutions and laws. The Chocó-Manabí Corridor is a cross-section of this biological, cultural, ethnic and constitutional diversity. It is also in danger of irreparable environmental degradation as a result of extreme pressures exerted by internal and external economic, political, and demographic forces. Fortunately, many stakeholders have joined in partnerships to address these threats to biodiversity and to the livelihood and security of the corridor's traditional inhabitants.
In Colombia, while much of the northern sector of the corridor is still intact, the southern sector, close to the Ecuadorian border, has been significantly fragmented and altered. It contains several large protected areas. Recent legal recognition of local ownership of land and other natural resources (including fish, shrimp, mangroves, and community forests) in the region encourages creative and promising conservation practices and sustainable use among indigenous and Afro-Colombian communities, as well as in mestizo communities established more recently in and around the national parks. The CEPF can catalyze preparation of land use management plans while also identifying and promoting sustainable production systems on these lands.
Ecuador also features a rich mix of civil society development and conservation organizations, many with considerable experience in the region and with time-tested environmental management concepts, methods, and technologies to share with their local counterparts. Here, too, given steady improvement in policy and legal frameworks, partnerships between government and civil society are now more easily established, more viable, and more durable. These partnerships enable larger programs and increased financing to be introduced and administered effectively, and allow for expansion and replication projects and best practices. CEPF resources can strengthen and enrich them.
Pressures are mounting, however, on the region's resources, as small farmers are driven out of the central highlands by violence and the narcotics trade in Colombia and are forced into the inhospitable rainforests of the Pacific coast. Other interests - such as logging of high-value timber species, gold and other mineral extraction, fishing and shrimp farming, and the exploitation of other forest and mangrove resources - stand to undermine the conservation goals of the Chocó-Manabí Corridor initiative. Large tracts of coastal rainforest are still being cleared for oil palm plantations and for extensive, inefficient cattle ranching. In addition, regional development plans supported under Plan Pacifico still rely on expanded port and road facilities, oil and gas pipelines, hydroelectric dams and transmission corridors, banana plantations, and other projects responding to global market pressures and opportunities. The success of the corridor initiative will depend largely on CEPF's identification of comparative programming and funding advantages, as well as the commitment and creativity needed to forge and maintain partnerships between sectors, between agencies, and between countries. Finally, the challenge of establishing and maintaining commitment to the Chocó-Manabí Corridor between the two nations cannot be underestimated, as political interests and other regional security and economic concerns may at any time supersede those of conservation and sustainable resource management.
This initiative is timely, addressing many specific opportunities for ecoregional investment and action within three strategic directions: development of local and regional mechanisms to foster corridor-level conservation among stakeholders, improved management of protected areas, and adoption of sustainable development practices in communities located in close proximity to protected areas. The investment strategy outlined in this profile will draw together many local, regional, national, and international partners in a ollaborative effort to promote conservation and sustainable development in the Chocó-Darién-Western Ecuador Hotspot.
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