Strengthening of governance, conservation and sustainable management of natural resources in the tri-national Putumayo River Basin

The project’s main goal is to strengthen local governance of communities and assist leaders in the three countries to develop a regional management plan. The tri-national area is an important area due to its biological and cultural diversity, the latter represented by the various indigenous and peasant communities living in the area. The rapid expansion of agriculture, illegal crops and extensive cattle ranching — as well as illegal logging and hunting, and a limited government presence — pose a risk to the area’s natural ecosystems and the people who depend on them. The 450,000-ha La Paya National Park is located in the Colombian part of the basin and contains part of the region’s natural forest. Although Colombian law restricts extractive activities inside national parks, communities harvest natural resources from both inside and outside the park for their subsistence.

Based on its work in the Amazon region, TBI Colombia hopes to establish and institutionalise a process of decisionmaking for resource management through local research in this area. In this approach, local people generate their own data about resource use, analyse it and use it in the participatory formulation of natural resource management plans for forests, wildlife hunting and land use. These management plans are a legal requirement of the Colombian government for autonomous areas that overlap national parks.