Cuban Project Boosts Protection of Mountain Ecosystem
- Written by Eglis Ricardo Girbau
- Published in Holguin
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"A landscape approach to preserve threatened mountain ecosystems" is a project headed since 2015 by MSc.Sergio Sigarreta Vilches, from the Environmental Research and Service Center of the Ministry of Science, Technology and Environment (Citma) and Yoana Pérez Pérez, its national manager.
The study responds to the implementation of Cuba's environmental strategy and biological diversity.
Funded by the Global Environment Fund and the Cuban government and coordinated by the Institute of Ecology and Systematics, the research is developed in four of the five mountain ranges of the Caribbean country.
The project is governed by the following guidelines: institutional organization, inter-institutional integration, protected areas and their surroundings, reasonable management of sustainable factors of the mountain, use of agro-ecological plants and fire protection, among others, with duration of 8 years. "We are going through the fourth year," said its coordinator.
"We aim at improving relations among institutions that develop activities in the Cuban mountains, such as the Plan Turquino communities, Citma academic institutions and protected area systems, which show tangible results," Sigarreta said.
The objective of this Project is to achieve the environmental order of the mountain massif, as well as to involve all the institutions that need to identify and evaluate the environmental limitations for its productive development.
This work has strengthened the management capacities of three parks (Mensura-Piloto, Pico Cristal and Alejandro de Humboldt) and contributes to the improvement of the forestry sector in the mountains through the support of forest nurseries, agroforestry farms and a farm of medicinal plants.
All these activities with a landscape approach seek to ensure that all sectors of the mountainous region join efforts in order to guarantee biological diversity.
The Project involves the companies Forestal de Mayarí and Flora and fauna of Moa, as well as the farms La Caridad and La Mora, in Mayarí; Colorado, La Güira and Granadillo, in Sagua de Tánamo, and Conrado, in Moa, next to the nurseries of Pinares de Mayarí, Cabonico and Arroyo Seco.