Clean Water for Rural Honduras

In recent years, Honduras has faced what experts are calling an ecological catastrophe brought about by an outbreak of southern pine beetle, Dendroctonus frontalis. The sudden explosion of southern pine beetles in 2015 in Honduras is being blamed on a warming climate by some scientists. The Honduran government declared the situation a national emergency, given the beetle’s dramatic destruction of primary forest and the associated risk of wildfire. Critical forest habitats for Honduras’ notable biodiversity are disappearing at alarming rates. Since its onset in 2015, the pine beetle plague has destroyed about 509,000 hectares (1.2 million acres) of pine forest, equivalent to one quarter of Honduras' primary forest cover.

The Honduran national government launched a national response to the outbreak, creating an Interagency Commission with support from the international community. Honduran military units were deployed to help combat the plague, cutting down infected trees and removing subsequent biomass. While some of EcoLogic's partner communities were reached by national forces, their work was short-term and communities and local governments were mostly left on their own to continue controlling the plague and manage its devastating impacts.

Our local partners have worked tirelessly to combat the outbreak, bring it to a halt, and restore affected areas. The infestation is now mostly under control. However, given this situation assisted natural regeneration (ANR) actions have been prioritized by the local project team to respond to the scale of loss of pine forest due to the particularly severe outbreak of the pine beetle.

They have prioritized the Uchapa-Pimienta watershed in the Department of Yoro. The work that has been done already in 316 hectares over the last several months includes:

Community monitoring: The project technician supported by the Environmental Unit of the Municipality of Olanchito and the National Forest Development Institute (ICF) train communities and participate in visits to several sites in the forest that is regenerating and condict visual evaluations of the regeneration. Long-term community involvement and support is critical in preventing the recurrence of disturbance events that will set back succession to the before-treatment state.

Fire prevention: The construction and maintenance of firebreaks is carried out by brigades, reducing the likelihood that a fire can burn standing forests and regenerating areas. Protecting against fire and other forms of disturbance is the most important ANR activity.

Weed control: Clearing weeds around regenerating seedlings.This helps accelerate the growth of seedlings by reducing competition from the weedy species for water, nutrients, and light.

Fire control: When forest fires cannot be prevented, the Environmental Unit of the Municipality of Olanchito and local partners take action to control and fight fires.

Demarcation and signage: of areas where natural regenerating is taking place to prevent further disturbances.

Prevention and enforcement against illegal logging: Forest guards and military police: conduct monitoring patrols to detect illegal logging and take enforcement actions.

We are working to expand this work to cover the entire degrade area and protect this important source of water, livelihoods, habitat, and biodiversity! Thank you so much for your interest and support.

EcoLogic’s priorities in Honduras are to develop a landscape-level approach to habitat conservation—which aims to increase connectivity between conservation areas—and to facilitate sustainable, community-driven land and water management. Our work involves communities around Pico Bonito National Park (PBNP, established 1987) in northern Honduras’ Nombre de Dios Mountain Range. Spanning 56,400 hectares, PBNP is designated IUCN Management Category II and is an internationally recognized priority area for biodiversity.

EcoLogic’s project works with communities within the southern buffer zone to conserve approximately 33,500 hectares of forest habitat, including critical watershed areas. This work is carried out in partnership with the Pico Bonito Southern Sector Water Council Association (AJAASSPIB). Approximately 30 km west of PBNP lays the 15,900-hectare Texiguat Wildlife Refuge (IUCN Category IV). Our project also works with communities located in the corridor between PBNP and Texiguat. This segment of the project, covering approximately 35,000 hectares of forest, is carried out in collaboration with the Alliance of Municipalities of Atlántida State (MAMUCA).

In addition to abundant biodiversity, these forests provide local inhabitants with clean water, fuel, and protection from natural disasters, as well as economic opportunities via ecotourism. Despite their global ecological importance, only two percent of Central America’s pine-oak forests are conserved within protected areas. In Honduras, the protected area designation often fails to fully prevent infringement, and the Honduran government is not actively enforcing the national park boundaries. Unprotected remnant and forest fragments bordering and lying beyond park boundaries face even greater pressure. Therefore, the onus is on local communities to lead park conservation efforts, with training and financial support from NGOs like EcoLogic.

Within this region, the three primary threats to forest habitats and watersheds which EcoLogic aims to address are: (1) the conversion of forest to farm and pasture lands; (2) the felling of trees for fuel wood and illegal logging; and (3) inadequate management of natural resources. Given these risks, conservation priorities include halting deforestation, protecting remaining tracts of old-growth forest, and coordinating the restoration of degraded areas of land.

Though intensive reforestation has the potential to slow biodiversity loss, alone, it is not a substitute for the preservation of original forest cover. A strategy that combines restoration and protection with sustainable use has the strongest chance to flourish in the long run with local community acceptance and leadership.

This year, across our project sites in Honduras, EcoLogic will:

• Work with established water committees to increase local management capacity and effectiveness
• Raise nearly a quarter million trees in community-managed tree nurseries
• Reforest 600 hectares of degraded land, and assist in the natural reforestation of 200 additional hectares
• Construct 16 kilometers of firebreaks to protect vulnerable forests from wildfire
• Train 60 community members in effective forest fire management
• Help to establish 10 community-based environmental funds to support local conservation activity
• Conduct 16 fire monitoring/assessment field surveys
• Construct 300 fuel-efficient stoves, and train 700 community members in proper stove use and maintenance
• Construct 200 new household farm plots
• Train 400 community members in agroforestry methods
• Establish 22 hectares of agroforestry parcels
• Establish 20 hectares of silvopature
• Convene workshops addressing community use of resources for 320 participants
• Organize 4 learning exchanges to share conservation strategies among communities