UNESCO: reserves and geoparks in Latin America underestimate climate risks

Climate risks for biosphere reserves and geoparks Latin America are higher than previously believed and the authorities that manage them underestimate these conditions, which will worsen in the immediate and medium-term future, according to a study presented this Tuesday by the UNESCO.

Through the analysis of 10 biosphere reserves and 5 geoparks in 9 Latin American and Caribbean nations -Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Ecuador, Guatemala, Honduras, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Mexico and Uruguay-, UNESCO has studied adaptation and the impact against 11 priority risks, such as forest fires, drought, floods or the risk of water supply being cut off.

These dangers are “worse than thought”given that “For almost all risks, the number of places that recorded medium/high risk conditions exceeded the expectations of the place managers”indicates the study.

In addition, these 15 places – which were taken as a representative sample of the 132 Biosphere Reserves and the 12 UNESCO World Geoparks that exist throughout the region – are expected to experience “new climate impacts” or phenomena already recorded but at a greater intensity if “trends continue”.

For example, only 6 of the 15 places studied – which include, for example, the Mata Atlântica biosphere reserve in Brazil, the Uruguayan Grutas del Palacio geopark or the Maya biosphere reserve in Guatemala – had been identified as “priorities” regarding forest fires.

But the report found that 13 of the 15 locations are expected to have a medium to high wildfire risk for 2040-2059 if current trends continue.

“What we see is that many of the managers who are acting at the site level are doing their planning based on the challenges they face today or would face before”Serena Heckler, a UNESCO specialist in earth sciences and one of the authors of this report, told EFE.

“And what we are saying is that the climate change scenarios that are generating the projections for the coming decades tell us that there are going to be stronger impacts.”Heckler added.

Impact for people and economies

This study also analyzed 350,000 square kilometers of forest cover and found that “lost a 4% in just 6 years (14,190 km2 lost in 2015-2021), including a 0.7% (2,740 square kilometers) due to forest fires”.

But the threat of increased disasters and disasters also has direct consequences for humans.

According to this study, 3.3 million inhabitants of the areas analyzed – where a total of 110 million people reside – live in places susceptible to flooding; 10.7 million inhabitants are in areas exposed to water supply interruptions and another 8 million are exposed to landslides.

If he 23% of the geography analyzed is dedicated to agriculture (of a total of 1 million square kilometers), the vast majority (90%) They are exclusively rainfed plantations and the farmers ““They are especially vulnerable to the loss of agricultural production.” due to decreased rainfall, prolonged heat waves or changes in rainfall.

The good news is that these kinds of studies can serve to encourage a paradigm shift in management plans, and not just for UNESCO-designated sites. Otherwise, there would be a “catastrophe”which also affects people with fewer resources more intensely, warns Heckler.

For site managers, this study is “a gift” and one “baseline” with a view to the construction of prevention plans and to mobilize technical skills from other actors, Chilean Patricia Herrera, coordinator of the Kütralkura Geopark, located 700 kilometers from Santiago, on the border with Argentina, and famous for its volcanoes and araucarias.

In your country, for example, in 2022 a Climate Change Framework law was approved and what was previously the National Emergency Office is today called the National Risk Prevention System.. “There is a paradigm shift”he points out, although it is still “a process” on going.

This process, Herrero emphasizes, must be done through territorial planning and with local communities, whose knowledge and needs on the ground must be part of the plans, as Heckler also agrees. “We have to push and put the grains of sand where we are,” remembers Herrero.