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Adaptive Natural Resources Management Will Bolster Cabécar Communities
Winner
2009-1041
Asociación IXACAVAA de Desarrollo e Información Indígena
Costa Rica
195000
Resilience of Indigenous Peoples Communities to Climate Risks
Environment
2010
About 10 tropical storms hit the Cabécar communities in Costa Rica every year, often flooding the area. A project by a local NGO, Ixacavaa, has been selected for a DM award to rescue ancestral knowledge and combine it with new technologies to ensure that local production systems and resource management is climate-resilient.
Objectives:
To help inhabitants of Bajo Chirripó to increase their capacity to adapt to climate change through the adaptive management of natural resources and the reduction of vulnerability to external events, based on the combination of ancient knowledge and modern technology. Expectations are that (1) more than 50 percent of families will participate in the ancient knowledge rescue process, (2) at least three products or services will be made suitable for their integration into the market, and (3) zones at high risk of flooding will be identified and mapped in 50 percent of the indigenous territory.
Rationale:
The Cabécar indigenous territory communities of Bajo Chirripó are settled in an area of difficult access, low productivity, and high flood risk that is also highly vulnerable to the impact of climate change. This area is stricken by an average of over 10 tropical storms every year, affecting its production system based on subsistence agriculture, its infrastructure, and its human population. Climate change is expected to increase the frequency and intensity of floods, creating greater vulnerability in the area. The project seeks to rescue ancient knowledge and combine it with new technologies to design adaptive production systems with less vulnerability to storms and flooding and greater potential to contribute to local development.
Innovation / Expected Results:
A combination of the ancient indigenous knowledge with modern, non-indigenous technology (technological syncretism) is proposed in order to create adaptive production systems that are capable of addressing the negative effects of climate change and to improve the socioeconomic conditions of the indigenous populations, who currently live only on subsistence systems.