Improving environmental governance in Upper Paraguay
The launch of the deforestation monitoring project in El Chaco Americano seeks to reduce the rate of loss of the largest tropical dry forest in South America, building local capacities to act swiftly in case of irregular changes in land use
This initiative is promoted by the Guyra Paraguay Association, the Avina Foundation and CAF—development bank of Latin America—, through the Innovación con Sentido platform, to quantify the area deforested in the Chaco region at national, department and municipal level, and to issue environmental licenses to facilitate land use monitoring.
In the last 5 years, a total of 1,982,749 hectares have been deforested in the Gran Chaco region, one of the highest rates worldwide. This warrants stricter monitoring and assessing the legality of changes in land use, in order to promote sustainable management of the largest dry forest on the planet and the second largest wooded biome in South America.
To this end, the project includes training of municipal officials from the districts of Fuerte Olimpo and Bahía Negra in Upper Paraguay in order to identify possible violations of legal provisions through satellite imaging, and to produce up-to-date information on floods and wildfires.
This initiative is part of the programs of the Innovación con Sentido platform, a strategic partnership between global, regional, national and local organizations that seeks to foster the fight against poverty and to produce a social impact, by integrating social, technology and business innovation.