In the lush jungle of northern Guatemala – in the largest protected area in Central America – 30 leaders from Colombia’s Amazon basin region are exchanging strategies with local Mayan farmers on how to live off this dense forest without destroying it.
Beneath the tall shady mahogany and cedar trees in the Mayan Biosphere Reserve, the visiting group discusses ways to ensure the rainforest remains healthy, while studying the reserve model that Guatemala has been developing since 1994.
Guatemala’s vast sustainability project aims to achieve a balance in which communities reforest, cut trees for wood in a controlled way, grow cereals and vegetables, collect ornamental plants and even develop low-impact tourism.
“This ensures that our communities receive the economic resources that are also invested here for conservation,” Sergio Balan, regional director of the National Council of Protected Areas (CONAP), told AFP in the village of Melchor de Mencos, near the border with Belize. .
The Mayan Biosphere Reserve spans 2.1 million hectares (5.2 million acres) and borders Mexico and Belize.
Every year, its flora and fauna are threatened by fires, deforestation for agricultural and livestock purposes and even drug trafficking.
Hundreds of archaeological sites are located in this territory, such as the ancient Mayan city of Tikal, one of the main tourist sites in Guatemala and a place that welcomes visitors to the Forestry Development and Biodiversity Centers of the Colombian Amazon.
In the reserve and close to Tikal, there is also the pre-Hispanic park of Uaxactun, where both groups participated in a Mayan ceremony with fire fed with candles and tree resin.
The Colombian leaders, whose visit lasted a week, highlighted progress in reducing deforestation in the Colombian Amazon between 2021 and 2023, by 61 percent, according to data from Colombia’s environment ministry.
– From farmer to farmer –
There are currently 16 active concessions that help conserve around 619 thousand hectares of forest, says CONAP. Meanwhile, controlled logging licenses allow private companies to work for periods of 25 or 30 years.
Concessions and reserves “not only provide employment, but also training for different jobs,” says Erwin Maas, a Guatemalan tour guide who is also familiar with forestry.
CONAP estimates that the concessions, a type of activity grant, will create around 150,000 direct and indirect jobs in the reserve.
Along a section of the path, the visitor finds a row of cut logs that are stacked to be taken to the sawmill. The wood comes from trees selected for cutting in a controlled process that will allow the forest to regenerate.
Nearby, the sound of birds and monkeys flying through the branches mixes with the group’s conversation.
“One of the big ideas we took away is the form of organization they had (in Guatemala) to really last over time,” says Aristides Oime, president of a Colombian agricultural group, Asojuntas de Cartagena del Chaira.
“Farmer to farmer, we see how we can really improve,” he said. “We want to show how we truly believe that deforestation is not the way forward, the true way is environmental conservation.”
The coordinator of the Colombia-based NGO Heart of the Amazon, Luz Rodriguez, believes that although there are differences with Guatemalan communities, they have learned lessons about how other people control the land in a sustainable way.
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