News

News

As CSF's new BUILD Program Operations Manager, Irene Burgués Arrea has found herself traveling all over the world in order to promote biodiversity conservation through infrastructure best practices. From her native country of Costa Rica, to the forest of Uganda (with stops in Bolivia and Brazil in between), Irene is jumping right in.
On January 17, CSF course graduate José Serra and CSF's Alfonso Malky presented an economic study of the proposed Inambari dam, designed to generate hydropower primarily for Brazilian consumers. The study, sponsored by the Wildlife Conservation Society's Peru office, examines the feasibility of the project, which would harness energy from an Amazon tributary in the country's southeastern jungle. Serra led the investigation, looking into the overall economic return, environmental costs, profits for the dam builder and impacts on various sectors of Peruvian society. Results showed that the project's feasibility depends on charging a relatively high electricity price and delivering benefits, in the form of flow control, to downstream dams in Brazil.
CSF recently released the HydroCalculator Version 3.0 with two major advances. First, the tool interactively enables the user to pinpoint the exact location of the hydro project on a map, which can show satellite imagery and terrain. Second, a global map of land-cover types, with corresponding carbon densities, has been linked to the tool so that it automatically calculates net carbon emissions. Advanced users can override the land-cover selection and choose up to four different types of land-covers flooded by the dam, and their respective shares of the area inundated. We have added dozens of land-cover types – all of those included in the Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center dataset.
CSF has now helped to conserve more than 20 million acres of flourishing ecosystems. That's a big jump from our past reckonings and due largely to the role our Brazilian team has played in slowing badly planned roads and supporting investment in protected areas and indigenous lands. CSF's success centers on reinforcing the efforts of countless local advocates, park managers and scientists on the front lines of conservation and development decisions, giving them a solid economic rationale and strategy for conservation in the face of looming threats.
In early December, CSF’s Marcos Amend delivered economics know-how to students in the Professional Masters for Protected Area Managers program run by INPA (National Institute for Amazon Research). The program's objective is to train managers to face the challenges of protected areas management in Amazon region. This is the second time CSF has contributed to the program, which was founded by CSF course graduate Rita Mesquita.
An hour drive from Kampala lies the Mabira Forest, one of the few remaining natural forest reserves in Uganda. Rich in biological diversity, the forest contributes to the livelihood of the adjacent communities and provides an opportunity for ecotourism. In 2009 the Sugar Corporation of Uganda Limited (SCOUL) requested permission from the government to use part of the Mabira Central Forest Reserve for sugarcane growing. CSF graduate Ronald Kaggwa took action. An environmental economist at the Uganda National Environmental Management Authority (NEMA), Ronald conducted an economic analysis to prove that the net benefits of conservation far outweighed those of sugarcane.
CSF's Irene Burgués and John Reid traveled to Uganda in November to establish our first long-term program in Africa. The program's initial focus will be on conserving ecosystems in the context of major infrastructure development in the Albertine Rift region shared by Uganda, Rwanda, Democratic Republic of Congo and Tanzania. The region is home to cloud forests, lowland rain forests and savannas, along with active volcanoes and endangered wildlife such as the mountain gorillas. CSF will work with government and NGOs to minimize the impact of new roads, dams and oil on these fragile resources. We are fortunate to have the partnership of the Uganda National Environmental Management Authority (NEMA) as we begin this process.
By investing in ecotourism, Belize has protected more than a third of it's total land area, as well as about 13 percent of it's marine area. As a world leader in conservation, CSF's Venetia Hargreaves-Allen believes the Bahamas could learn significantly from Belize's success. Formerly the principal investigator for the Marine Managed Area Economic Valuation in Belize with Conservation International, Hargreaves-Allen turned her focus to the Bahamas in a marine management study conducted in 2010. She recently presented her findings at a public meeting at the Bahamas National Trust.
Conservation Strategy Fund's Economic Tools for Conservation training course will be offered next year in Micronesia thanks to a grant from the David and Lucile Packard Foundation and a partnership with 2010 international course graduate Willy Kostka and the Micronesian Conservation Trust (MCT). The course will be CSF's first in the Western Pacific region. The training will support conservation of marine and forest resources in Micronesia by equipping conservation practitioners, natural resource managers and community leaders with the principles and tools of conservation economics.
CSF will launch African and Himalayan initiatives and expand Andes-Amazon programs through $1.2 million agreement with Biodiversity Understanding in Infrastructure and Landscape Development (BUILD) program of USAID. The United States Agency for International Development (USAID) recently announced a $1.2 million agreement with Conservation Strategy Fund (CSF) to launch a comprehensive initiative in central Africa, expand CSF’s programs in the Andes-Amazon region, and initiate a limited program in Asia’s Himalayan region. The goal of the program is to promote biodiversity conservation through infrastructure best practices.