Conservation Payments to Ecuador: Yasuní

1. pulsarmedia.eu Conservation Payments to Ecuador: Yasuní sosyasuni.org earthfirstnews.wordpress.com • Liz Boyden • Amanda Hopper

2. Evolution • Needed to promote more conservation and alleviate poverty • Previous applications: • Sustainable forest management • ICDP’s (Integrated conservation and development projects) • Brundtland Report of 1987 • Earth Summit in 1992 • (Wunder 2007)

3. What is a Payment for Environmental Services (PES)? • Trade for potentially scarce environmental services • Payments from outside beneficiaries • Direct, contractual, or conditional • Voluntary • Payments can go for conservation or restoration actions • (Wunder 2005)

4. What is a PES • 4 main types of PES: • Carbon sequestration and storage • Protection of biodiversity • Protection of watersheds • Landscape beauty

5. Yasuní National Park • Located in the northeast corner of Ecuador bordering Peru. • Declared an UNESCO International Biosphere in 1979. • One of the most bio-diverse regions in the world, and is the largest wilderness area in the country. • 2.5 million acres of wetlands, swamps, marshes, lakes, rivers and dry land forests. • High species richness • Home to the Waorani, one of the last indigenous tribes today still isolated in the Amazon. yasunimovie.wordpress.com

6. ITT 2007 Initiative • Compensation to Ecuador for not exploiting oil reserves underlying the Yasuni National Park, a Biosphere Reserve for Humanity located in the Amazon Region. • Ishpingo–Tambococha–Tiputini Fields • On September 24, 2007, the president of the Republic of Ecuador, Rafael Correa Delgado addressed the UN assembly to keep the oil from the ITT fields in the ground indefinitely (Rival 2010). • Debt relief or direct compensation for carbon credits. http://www.liveyasuni.org/ (Rival 2010)

7. Overview • Extraction causes Pollution • Reduces climate change effects • Maintain indigenous land • Benefits from the ecosystem • Is the Oil worth it?? • Maintains high biodiversity • Enhances further management and conservation actions for the Yasuni and other programs • PES success in other projects • Conservation policies

8. Pollution • If extracted would create 410 million tons of carbon dioxide (HUGE POLLUTION) • To purchase a carbon permits to pollute legally would cost $6 billion. • For every 1 barrel of oil 4 barrels of water are produced. • The water is re-injected back into the ground.

9. Reduction of Climate Change Effects • Deforestation in the amazon rainforest accounts for 20 to 25 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. • As the forest is cleared, the burning or decaying vegetation release massive amounts of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas known to speed up the effects of global climate change. • A recent study predicts the over 40% of the Amazon plant species will become extinct from global warming. • Yasuni is predicted to maintain a stable climate making it critical for the survival of thousands of plant species and the depending fauna.

10. Indigenous Land • Waorani Indigenous People • Living in isolation from the rest of civilization in the Amazon. • Land located on of the ITT oil block. • Occupied the land for the past 5 centuries. • Oil development threatens the tribe and goes against the international law on rights of indigenous people.

11. Indigenous Land • "What will happen when our children grow up? Where will they live when they are older?  Our rivers are tranquil and in the forests we find the food, medicines and other necessities that we need. What will happen when the oil companies finish destroying what we have?"  • Letter from Waorani community members to the President of Ecuador in July 2005

12. Ecosystem Benefits • Flood mitigation • Sedimentation • Erosion Control • Watersheds • Landscape Beauty

13. Is the Oil Worth it? • Approx. 846 to 950 million barrels of oil?? • The high permeability of the subsoil prevents full recovery of the heavy crude • Hard to determine quality • Only 10 days of world oil consumption • Not a simple market commodity • (Rival 2010)

14. Is the Oil Worth it? • Have reached a new generation of “value” • Must put monetary value on unexploited oil (stored carbon dioxide) and preservation of land • Each barrel of exploited oil is $5 = approx. $5 billion over 20 years • Each ton of carbon dioxide in a barrel is $20 with .44 ton in one barrel = approx. $8.8 billion over 20 years (Rival 2010)

15. Biodiversity • Yasuni National Park has a core with overlapping world species richness • This core incorporates four major taxonomic groups • Amphibian • Bird • Mammal • Plant • Only Eastern Ecuador and Northern Peru have this overlap

16. (Bass 2010)

17. Biodiversity • One of world’s most biodiverse sites (species richness) • This biodiversity is thought to derive from climate and location • Among lowland forests, Yasuni holds the world record for most species of epiphytes • World record: 139 species of amphibian • World record: 100,000 species per hectare of insects • More fish species than the Mississippi River Basin • Yasuni harbors 1/3 of the Amazon Basin’s amphibian and reptile species • (Bass 2010)

18. (Bass 2010)

19. Biodiversity • Yasuni has multiple endemic species • The park is the only “strict” protected conservation area by IUCN • IUCN has listed multiple threatened species in the Park • 13 invertebrate species • 56 plant species • Rollinia Helosioides • 2 important populations of globally endangered mammals • White-bellied spider monkey • Giant Otter (Bass 2010)

20. Further Management and Conservation Actions • Initiative can serve as a model for other ecosystem protection (Marx 2007) • Money will go towards: • Reforestation projects • Sustainable energy development • Livelihood training programs • SNAP • Has promoted global activity

21. Further Management and Conservation Actions • Get back to the value of Ecuadorian indigenous wisdom • Vision of a new constitution: • “nature certain rights in terms of its life cycles, with the aim to respect and regenerate them.” • “find new levels of development” • “survive in harmony” • (Rival 2010)

22. Other Successful PES Projects • Pimampiro • Watershed services • 5 years • PROFAFOR • Carbon sequestration • 13 years • Socio Bosque Program of 2008 • Most recent • Benefits are already prevalent

23. Policy Recommendations • 1. No new roads or access routes • 2. No new oil exploration and development • 3. Create biological corridors to higher Andean parks • 4. Create a system of strict protected areas and “no-go” zones • 5. Protected corridor between Yasuni and Cuyabeno Wildlife Reserve • (Bass et al. 2010)

24. Conclusion • “It is our own addiction that fuels the need to exploit this oil” • “Life is more than Oil” (Rival 2010)

25. References Alban, M. and Wunder S. (2008). "Decentralized payments for environmental services: The cases of Pimampiro and PROFAFOR in Ecuador." Ecological Economics. 65:685-698. Balmford, A. and Whitten T. (2003). "Who should pay for tropical conservation, and how could the costs be met?." Oryx. 37(2): 238-249. Bass M.S. et al. (2010). Global Conservation Significance of Ecuador's Yasuní National Park. PLoS ONE 5(1): e8767 Benitez et al. (2006)."Conservation payments under risk: a stochastic dominance approach." American Journal of Agricultural Econcomics. 88(1): 1-15. Engel et al. (2008): "Designing payments for environmental services in theory and practice: An overview of the issues." Ecological Economics. 65: 663-674. Knocke et al. (2009): "Effectiveness and Distributional Impacts of Payments for Reduced Carbon Emissions from Deforestation." Erdkunde, Archive for Scientific Geography. 63(4): 365-384. Koning et al. (2011) "Bridging the gap between forest conservation and poverty alleviation: the Ecuadorian Socio Bosque program." Environmental Science and Policy. 14: 531-542. Koning et al. (2007). "Modelling the impacts of payments for biodiversity conservation on regional land-use patterns." Landscape and Urban Planning. 83: 255-267. Live yasuni. (2007). Retrieved from http://www.liveyasuni.org/ Marx E. (2010). The fight for Yasuni. Science.330(6008): 1170. Pagiola, S. (2006)."Payments for Environmental Services: Combining science." Environmental Department, World Bank.

26. References Pagiola et al. (2002). Selling forest environmental services: market-based mechanisms for conservation and development. London: Earthscan Publications Ltd: 91-103. Southgate et al. (2009). "Payments for Sustainability ." Harvard International Review. 31(2): 54-57. Quintero et al. (2009). "For services rendered? Modeling hydrology and livelihoods in Andean payments for environmental services schemes." Forest Ecology and Management. 258: 1871-1880. Rival L. (2010). Ecuador's Yasuní-ITT initiative: The old and new values of petroleum. Ecological Economics, 70(2): 717-723. Wunder, S. (2006)."Are Direct Payments for Environmental Services Spelling Doom for Sustainable Forest Management in the Tropics?." Ecology and Society. 11(2): 1-12. Wunder, S. (2007). "The efficiency of payments for environmental services in tropical conservation." Conservation Biology. 21(1): 48-58. Wunder, S. (2005). "Payments for environmental services: Some nuts and bolts." Center for International Forestry Research: 1-32.