A Proposal for Independent Study
Department of Geography
University of Washington

By:  Eugene W. Martin

For: Dr. Nicholas R. Chrisman
Dr. Lucy A. Jarosz
Dr. Victoria L. Lawson

Submitted:  July 1997

Abstract:
Ecuador is one of the most biologically diverse locations on Earth and has set aside roughly 16% of its national territory in national parks and biological preserves.  Management of these resources is the responsibility of the Ecuadorian government which has been hindered in this endeavor by lack of sufficient resources. Many local non governmental organizations concerned with conservation in Ecuador have been created in recent years and are participating in various activities aimed at conserving and managing Ecuador’s natural resources.   The lack of information and analysis capabilities has prompted both the government and some of the NGO’s to initiate geographic information system projects to support their decision making and planning needs.  This investigation proposes to evaluate three private and one public conservation GIS projects to ascertain their technical aspects, information inputs and resulting products along with observations pertaining to the institutional contexts.  Additional investigations will be made of a sample information product to see how results of these projects are employed to affect policies and/or actions relating to the management and planning of Ecuador’s protected areas.  This research will contribute to improving the effectiveness of conservation GIS projects in the future, offer an awareness of how GIS projects function in developing countries and provide information on the existing projects to interested investigators and organizations.
 

 Introduction/Justification:
 Ecuador is a small country roughly the size of Colorado that straddles the equator on South America’s west coast.  Possessing a portion of the upper Amazon basin, the Andes mountains and the Galapagos Archipelago, Ecuador is one of the most biologically diverse locations on Earth.  Efforts to conserve this Biodiversity have resulted in the establishment of twenty state owned national parks and protected areas.  These reserves comprise over four million hectares, roughly 16% of the nation’s territory (Varea et al 1997) and have significant national and international importance.  Some of the local benefits derived from these areas include watershed protection and water production, tourism, timber resources, biological resources for biotechnology research, territory for indigenous peoples and protection of archeological sites (MacFarland, 1991).  In addition to the localized value of these resources, these protected areas are recognized as contributing to the World’s ecological wealth and the stability of a global ecosystem (Myers, 1988; USAID/Ecaudor, 1989).

 Efforts to preserve, conserve and manage Ecuador’s protected areas have been undertaken by the Government of Ecuador, local Non Governmental Organizations (NGO’s) and international NGO’s.  Management of Ecuador’s protected areas was the responsibility of the Ministerio de Agricultura y Ganaderia (MAG) until August, 1992 and is now the responsibility of  the Instituto Ecuatoriano Forestal y de Areas Naturales y Vida Silvestre (INEFAN) (INEFAN, 1993 p. 2).  Past and current management efforts by these governmental agencies have been limited due to lack of financial support, personnel, technical ability, equipment and conflicting legal mandates (USAID/Ecuador, 1989 pp. 57-58; Varea, et al, 1997, pp. 113-132).  Support, mostly financial and technical, has been offered to INEFAN from a variety of international sources to increase the effectiveness of this agency in administering the protected areas (INEFAN, 1993, p. 7-8).

 Explosive growth in conservation oriented NGO’s has taken place in Ecuador since 1984 (Meyer, 1993, pp. 200-202) in addition to the creation of other  conservation projects and initiatives (SUBIR, 1994; USAID/Ecuador, 1989, pp. 97-104).  The arrival of these groups and initiatives in the conservation arena in Ecuador indicates that there was a need for other perspectives and activities in the conservation movement to fill the voids not addressed by existing organizations.  The proliferation of these efforts can also be attributed to the availability of funding from a variety of international sources interested in the conservation of tropical biological resources (Meyer, 1989).  These organizations participate in a broad spectrum of activities including environmental education, legal reform, buffer zone management, alternative income generation, promotion of agroforestry, biological monitoring and investigation, ecotourism and sustainable ecosystem management.  While many of these activities are focused on areas other than the national parks and protected areas, some of these organizations work directly in the protected areas.  Some projects and investigations being conducted by NGO’s are done in cooperation with INEFAN.  Examples of these are the creation and implementation of management plans, delimitation of park boundaries, socio-economic studies of communities within park boundaries and training programs for park personnel.

 The growth and development of the private and public conservation movements in Ecuador has created the need for information gathering and analysis services to support planning and decision making processes.  The application of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to Ecuador’s natural resource situation has been viewed as an effective solution to the information vacuum due to this technology’s ability to combine divergent information sources and create a visual result that can be interpreted and utilized by decision makers (Troya, 1997).  Efforts to create GIS labs and the intent to acquire GIS technology and products by conservation NGO’s and the public sector is widespread.

 What are the main conservation GIS projects that currently exist and how are they contributing to the planning and decision making processes applied to the national parks and protected areas?  This investigation proposes to examine three GIS projects housed by NGO’s and one governmental GIS project operated by INEFAN/GEF to answer these questions.  In addition to ascertaining baseline information about the project such as technical specifications, funding and information sources, the application of the data products by the host organization and external organizations will also be evaluated.
By examining these institutions, their GIS projects and how the information they generate is impacting management decisions affecting Ecuador’s national protected areas, this study will contribute to the understanding of how GIS is applied in different social and political contexts.  Specifically, Ecuador’s situation is that of a developing country attempting to manage its natural resource during a time of unprecedented resource consumption through the spontaneous application of largely external funding sources and technology.  An understanding of how these projects are applying GIS and an evaluation to establish if the results are making a difference will help to shape the nature and evolution of future GIS projects so they will be more efficient and effective in meeting future information needs for protected area management purposes.

In addition to the questions of GIS in a social context and project effectiveness, this study will provide information on the main conservation GIS initiatives to interested organizations and investigators.   Information pertaining to the types of data being utilized in these different projects and if it is available to other researchers will help promote data and information sharing in the scientific community.  Such information on existing GIS projects relating to conservation efforts in Ecuador will encourage other investigations to make use of existing information resources and project abilities.

 Methods:

Study Area:

Organizations of Interest:

 Non Government Organizations:
Centro de Datos Conservacíon (CDC)
EcoCiencia
Fundacíon Antisana (FUNAN)
Fundacíon Maquipacuna
Fundacíon Natura
Sustainable Use of Biological
Resources (SUBIR)
The Nature Conservancy -
Regional Technical Unit

 Government Organizations:
Centro de Levantamientos Integrados de Recursos Naturales por Sensores Remotos (CLIRSEN).
CONADE
Direccíon Nacional de Recursos Naturales Renovables
GTZ (German equivalent of USAID)
INEFAN/GEF
ORSTOM (France)
USAID/Ecuador
 
Of these organizations, the following have been selected as subjects for this investigation because they among the largest or best established organizations and possess their own GIS facility oriented at conservation issues:

 Non Government Organizations:
EcoCiencia
Centro de Datos Conservación
Fundación Natura
 Government Organizations:
INEFAN/GEF
 
Research Plan:
The research will consist of three sequential components:
1. Available project documentation:  A review of project documentation or published resources relating or describing the GIS applications and information products produced by the subject organizations.
2. Interviews with project coordinators and technicians:  Semi structured interviews will be utilized to gather the following information:
a) Why the GIS project was created.
b) What was/are the funding sources.
c) What are the characteristics of the system (hardware, software, output)?
d) What data/information sources are being employed to address what questions?
e) What information products are being produced and for use by whom?
f) Are the data sources and the data products available to external parties?
3. Interviews with decision makers and policy makers who use information provided by GIS projects: Once the GIS projects themselves have been investigated, a second round of interviews will be conducted to determine how the results of these projects are being implemented.  A data product will be selected from each project and their impact on decision making for the national protected area system will be evaluated in the following manner:
a) What actions or policies of the institution housing the GIS project were created or altered through consideration of the data product?
b) What other organizations or institutions have made use of the data product?
c) How has knowledge of this data product been incorporated in to policies or initiatives relating to management of national protected areas?

Final Products:
This research project will cumulate in three products designed to make the results available to geographers in the US, Ecuador and elsewhere:
1. A technical paper,  with translations in English and in Spanish, to be submitted for publication in professional journals.  This paper will present the summaries of the technical aspects of the various projects, commentary on their social and political contexts and an analysis of how the project results have made an impact on the planning and management of Ecuador’s protected areas.
2. A document to be made public on the Internet that includes: a summary of the organizations investigated, the details of their GIS projects, what available information resources they possess and a general bibliography of resources.
3. A presentation to the faculty and students of the Geography Department upon completion of the project.
 Research Schedule:

All field activities will to be conducted beginning July 1, 1997 and concluding  August 31 of 1997.

Preparation of the technical paper and Internet resources will be completed by October 31, 1998.

Presentation of findings to department members will be made during Autumn Quarter, 1997.

 References and Bibliography:
CEPEIGE/PUCE.  1996.  II Coloquia Nacional: “Bases de Datos y Realidad Ecuatoriana” Memoria. Centro Panamericano de Estudios e Investigaciones Geograficas.  Quito, Ecuador.
CEPEIGE/PUCE.  1996.  II Coloquio Nacional: Directorio de Bases de Datos.  Centro Panamericano de Estudios e Investigaciones Geograficas.  Quito, Ecuador.
CLIRSEN.  1995.  Catologo de Precios de los Productos y Servicios.
Domínguez, Miguel.  1993.  La Tecnología Espacial en la vigilancia del Medio Ambiente.  Teledetección 1993. pp 17-26. CLIRSEN/IGM.  Quito, Ecuador
Fernández, Maria Augusta and Iván Apolo.  1993.  “Ecuador.” in Perspectivas y Experiencias de los SIG en America Latina.  Coleccion “Eventos Cientificos” No. 6  pp. 13-15. CEDEIGE.  Quito, Ecuador.
Fundación Natura.  1991.  Ecuador 2000: Previsiones de una consulta a expertos sobre el futuro del desarollo y el medio ambiente.  Fundación Natura.  Quito, Ecuador
Fundación Natura.  1991.  Lineamientos para un programa de investigaciones sobre areas naturales protegidas en el Ecuador (Sintesis).  Fundación Natura.  Quito, Ecuador
International Geographic Union.  1987.  Proceedings: I Conferencia Latino America Sobre Informacion y Geogafía.  5 - 9 Oct. 1987.  San Jose, Costa Rica.
MacFarland, Craig, Gonzalo Oviedo, Padraig Whelan and Valeria Merino.  1991.  A Project for the Global Environmental Facility.  Ecuador: Biodiversity Conservation through Strengthening of the Protected Areas System.  Proposal submitted to the Global Environmental Facility.
Meyer, Carrie A.  1993.  “Environmental NGO’s in Ecuador: An Economic Analysis of Institutional Change.”  In The Journal of Developing Areas.  27: 191-210.
Myer, N. 1988.  “Threatened Biotas: ‘Hotspots’ in Tropical Forests.” In The Environmentalist, Vol. 8, No. 3, pp. 1-20.
PUCC.  1991.  Proceedings: III Conferencia Latinoamericana Sobre Sistemas de Informacíon Geografíca por un Desarollo Sustentable en America Latina y el Caribe.  21 - 25 Oct. 1991.  Volumes I and II.  Viña del Mar, Chile.
Rodriguez, Fernando.  1997.  GIS coordinator for EcoCiencia. Personal communication.
SIBSIG.  1995.  Proceedings: 5a Conferencia y Curso Iberoamericano Sobre Sistemas de Informacion Geografica.  Universidad de Cuyo, Mendoza Argentina.
Sierra, Rodrigo.  1997.  Faculty member Arizona State University and consultant to EcoCiencia.  Personal communication.
Southgate, Douglas.  1992.  Development and the Environment: Ecuador’s Policy Crisis.
The Nature Conservancy.  Biodiversity Protection and Conservation in Ecuador.  A statement on the mission of The Nature Conservancy in Ecuador. Prepared by TNC Regional Technical Unit in Quito, Ecuador.
Troya, Roberto.  1997.  Director of The Nature Conservancy Regional Technical Unit - Quito Ecuador. Interview: July 1997.
USAID/Ecuador.  1989.  Natural Resource Management and Conservation of Biodiversity and Tropical Forests in Ecuador: A strategy for USAID.  Technical Information Center.  USAID. Quito Ecaudor.
Varea, Anamaría, Carmen Barrera, Ana María Maldonado, Lourdes Endara and Byron Real.  1997.  Ecologismo Ecuatorial  Centro de Educacíon Popular/Ediciones Abya-Yala.  Quito, Ecuador.