Bringing back the trees

Forest destruction has been the curse of modern Mexico. But the threat of climate change could help drive some ambitious reforestation, reports Ben Tuxworth.

Nearly half of Mexico’s original forests have fallen victim to logging and changes in land use since the 1950s. In the tropical south, less than a quarter of the original rainforest remains. Around 600,000-800,000 hectares are being lost each year, much of it through the expansion of extensive cattle ranching. But, according to the Mexican Government, the climate change mitigation potential of the nation’s forests is still enormous: around 107 million tonnes of carbon in 2010, a mainstay of the nation’s climate change strategy. So maintaining and restoring forest is a key priority for the country.

Forest conservation can be dangerous. Landowners, corrupt local officials and business interests are often ranged against grassroots leaders in a very unequal power battle, and several forest activists who have stood up to illegal logging operations have been murdered in recent years. But action to save the forests is building. Conservation groups have sprung up all over the country, many of them with women in the driving seat. Take the Organisation of Women Ecologists of the Sierra of Petatlán (OMESP), for example, which was founded in Guerrero State in 2001 by Celsa Valdovinos, the wife of forest activist Felipe Arreaga. OMESP promotes sustainable and organic agriculture, reforestation, recycling, and water and soil conservation – and has planted more than 175,000 red cedar trees with help from a nursery run by the Mexican army. OMESP members have also found there’s a living to be made from reforestation, with some earning $3,000 annually from selling tree seeds.

Some groups now manage substantial assets. Pati Ruiz Corzo founded the Grupo Ecológico Sierra Gorda (GESG) in 1987, and the organisation now manages 383,000 hectares of the Sierra Gorda Biosphere Reserve, about 400km north of Mexico City in Querétaro. With jagged mountains, cloud forests and semidesert areas, the reserve contains astonishing biodiversity including more than its fair share of endangered animals such as black bear, jaguar, Humboldt butterfly and military macaw. It’s also home to 93,000 people living in over 600 communities. Corzo moved to the area 25 years ago, looking to live closer to nature, but she found that Sierra Gordo had lost much of its natural vegetation. She set about mending things, bringing back soil fertility, vegetation and water, and recreating thriving habitats that now attract ecotourism and vital employment for local people, who provide accommodation and craft goods.

Growing ambitions

It was largely through Corzo’s efforts that the Government declared the Sierra Gorda region a protected area in May 1997. Corzo remains its most passionate advocate – with GESG now backed by a wide range of local and international sponsors, from HP to the Earth Island Institute. Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Dubai in November 2008, Corzo said: “We want to remind you that the vital services which allow life to go around come from ecosystem services, which come from the land of extremely poor communities. How can we help local people to develop, and enjoy wellbeing, as well as be ecosystem service providers? If we understand this, we will turn poverty into wealth for rural communities.”

With around 40% of men still leaving the area to find employment in the US, GESG is now using the forest to raise money on the carbon market. Via its commercial operation Bosque Sustentable, GESG has been selling carbon offsets in the voluntary market since 2006, the first sale being to the United Nations Foundation. Cash raised from offsetting is used to plant more trees and create sustainable jobs for local people. Corzo has commissioned estimates that suggest trees in Sierra Gordo may be worth over a billion dollars as carbon sinks, and the hope is that this resource will ultimately provide sufficient income to keep the men from leaving for the US.

The Government, too, is getting in on the forest protection act. As part of his administration’s new commitment to the environment, Mario Molina joined President Calderón to launch the ProÁrbol campaign in 2007, with a plan to plant 250 million trees in ten years, using indigenous species of pine, cypress, agave, yucca and oak.

Prompted by ProÁrbol, a group of companies including bakery giant Grupo Bimbo [see below], Santander Serfin, HP, the Wal-Mart Foundation and online retailer Sam’s Club, a division of Wal-Mart, have established Reforestamos México. This new NGO is building public support and action for reforestation and climate change more generally, with programmes on tree planting, forest management, community development and forest culture, and a website where Mexicans can calculate their carbon emissions.

By August 2008, the National Forest Commission claimed that 50 million seedlings had been distributed around the country, and they were aiming to reach their 250-million target by the end of the year. And it’s not just in rural areas that trees are coming back. Because Mexico City loses around 400 hectares of greenfield land each year to development – mainly through squatting and illegal logging – the campaign has also targeted urban areas. Three million trees have been planted in 25 communities over in the city’s rural southern zone.

This article is part of the Green Futures Special Publication Viva la vida verde, in which we set out the key sustainability challenges facing Mexico, and showcase some of the innovative green breakthroughs under way. Read more articles here.

27 February 2009

Ben Tuxworth