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This project serves people in the Cazaderos region of southeastern Ecuador, near the Peru border, where essential government services are virtually absent. This project is part of a comprehensive Nature & Culture International (NCI) program that is securing an overall Cazaderos Biosphere Conservation and Development Area in both Ecuador and Peru, ensuring long term essential benefits for people in the County of Zapotillo, Loja Province, Ecuador and northwest Peru, while protecting a vital 26,000 acre tropical forest adjacent to the Northwestern Peruvian Biosphere Reserve.
Following proven NCI methodology, this project will:
1. Organize and train a community management committee; establish regulations covering fishing, foraging, hunting, fresh water and waste water for community health and sustaining fish and wildlife; and establish sustainable community-based enforcement of regulations and zoning.
2. Improve education at three local schools and one regional high school, by:
a. Training teachers, developing curriculum for students at 3 schools emphasizing water quality, solid waste management and sustainable forest use,
b. Building school and home gardens for fruit, vegetable and medicinal plant production, for nutrition and health, important where there are no doctors; and
3. Improve community health, by contracting one local nurse and collaborating with local doctors and dentists who volunteer their time for community health campaigns, for
a. Preventative health lectures and demonstrations at community meetings,
b. Lectures and activities on improving diet to fill in on nutrient deficiencies, and
c. A course on clean drinking water and preparing hydration fluids for babies at risk of fatal dehydration due to micro-organisms in drinking water.
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