Venezuela: Contribution to sustainable development in Canaima National Park

A technical cooperation agreement was signed today between the Bolivar State Indigenous Federation (FIB) and the Andean Development Corporation (CAF). Under the agreement, the international financial organization grants $20,000 for the Participative Development Project of the FIB Operating Plan.

The development of the operating plan will strengthen the FIB in its objective of meeting its responsibilities as joint participant in the Canaima-GEF project, known as "Expansion of Alliances for the National Parks System."

CAF Executive Vice President Luis Enrique Berrizbeitia, after signing the agreement with FIB President Juvencio Gómez, said that the cooperation was in the framework of CAF’s objective to promote and preserve sustainable development through conservation of biodiversity and the ecosystem in its shareholder countries.

Last July, an inter-institutional cooperation agreement was signed between the National Parks Institute (Inparques), the state utility CVG Electrificación del Caroní CA and the FIB, to strengthen conservation of biodiversity, the participation of indigenous communities in the development and promotion of a new management model in Canaima National Park, and the setting up of sustainable financing mechanisms.

The Caniama project was designed on the basis of a joint effort among various institutions in the public and private sectors, organized civil society, the World Bank and the CAF, with Inparques as the executing agency. The objectives are to contribute to the conservation of biodiversity and the strengthening of the National Parks System by developing capacities to implement an integrated management model for protected areas.

The project is a pilot experience for the execution of sustainable financing mechanisms aimed at the socioeconomic and cultural improvement of indigenous and local communities, through an innovative alliance between indigenous peoples and the relevant sectors and public bodies, which it is hoped will evolve into a new management model for Canaima National Park, replicable in all the National Parks System.