This new project will be implemented near Sincelejo with the communities living there in order to develop actions for the conservation and recovery of the tropical dry forest.
This project is being developed in partnership with the SWISSAID foundation. This partnership, which is involved in several projects in Colombia, enables the foundation to strengthen and empower local action. SWISSAID shares our values and thus contributes the development of the Colombian civil society.
Toluviejo, a municipality with important ecological and social challenges
The selected areas of intervention are located in the buffer zone of the Serranía de Coraza, in the village of La Siria, in the municipality of Toluviejo, and in the Warsaw hills, in the Warsaw district of the municipality of Toluviejo, four hours from Cartagena.
The activities developed in Toluviejo have up to now been linked to limestone mining and extensive cattle farming. The inhabitants currently have few resources and live off cattle farming to the detriment of the forests. Historically, slash-and-burn agriculture has been practiced to provide more space for cattle. Limestone extraction also has had an effect on the deforestation of hills such as Warsaw Hill and an impact on the quality of water for human consumption. Farmers also produce goat’s cheese, basic products and make a living from small businesses. Some of them work as motorbike taxis to facilitate travelling between the various villages of the region.
The others keep working in the nearby coal mines. In partnership with the local communities, Envol Vert offers to generate environment-friendly economic alternatives for the beneficiaries of the project. Envol Vert benefits from the support of several inhabitants of the region who wish to develop collective processes to better protect their environment, their water resources and generate new development opportunities for the territory.
Restoration and protection of an endemic biotope
The biotope of the dry forests of the Caribbean zone is vulnerable to local and global climate change. This is a region in which temperature increase is bound to have irreversible consequences. Climate change is already generating increasingly erratic rainfall cycles that are hazardous for production in these drylands. After making a survey and mapping the area, corridors have been identified and natural water points have been found.
So Go Green projects to restore aquatic and ecological corridors in areas of environmental importance in the Coraza mountain range, the Pichilin and Coraza streams and in Warsaw Hill. The plan therefore includes the creation of a protected environment-friendly area.
Agroforestry and woodland pastures as models of sustainable agricultural development
The protection of Toluviejo’s forests will also be guaranteed through the establishment of short- and long-term agroforestry and silvopastoral systems to ensure the reforestation of native species, the recovery of water sources and the adjustment to climate change.
Indeed, in the range of its various projects Envol Vert has succeeded in implementing agroforestry systems with local populations thanks to the awareness raising and training of local actors.
Inhabitants’ economic autonomy
Envol Vert now projects to identify green economic and commercial alternatives for the sustainable use of the Serranía Coraza forest with participative strategies. This is an essential condition for the project to thrive and generate sustainable income for the farmers. Among the economic alternatives considered are the use of guáimaro, el guasimo and ecotourism.
