Report

My experience in the World Citizenship Program was highly successful. It provided me with the opportunity to visit a very interesting and multicultural country. At the same tim, it allowed me to see how the Bolivian forestry system is organized and to meet people directly involved with sustainable forest management in the Bolivian lowlands, especially logging crews in private and communally owned forest concessions.

Since I had previously worked in the lowlands of Santa Cruz as a biologist a year before the internship, I had made many friends and contacts who helped me during the internship. I also received abundant support and advice from the Bolivian Sustainable Forestry Project (BOLFOR) which contributed to my success during my summer 2001 internship. I also think that another key to my success was that I was well aware of the activities that the Forest Management Trust (FMT) was developing in Bolivia. This, then, helped me in designing a project of interest to both FMT and BOLFOR.

The research project I carried out compared logging crews' perspectives on sustainable forest management. Since workers in forests being logged are the people who make decisions about implementation of the forest management techniques, understanding their attitudes, backgrounds, interests and capabilities is critical for adoption of the environmental recommendations for sustainable forest management.

I very much enjoyed traveling around the beautiful countryside of the Department of Santa Cruz. I visited a private forest concession called "Empresa Agroforestal La Chonta" that encompasses 100,000 hectares of certified forest in the province of Guarayos. The is a humid tropical forest, is very dense and tall, invaded with woody vines, and it contains an incredible diversity of animals. At any time that I went walking along forest trails, encounters with spider, howler and capuchin monkeys were common. Every afternoon I was delighted by the visits of Blue and Red Macaws that nested on a big tree near our campsite.

At La Chonta Forest Concession, I had the good fortune to observe the process of Reduced Impact Logging operations and learned from the logging crew their experiences of adopting sustainable forest management techniques. Logging crews in private concessions are not owners of the forest; sometimes they are not even from the region, but they have worked in the forestry business for a long time. They have, therefore, experienced the change from the old forestry system to more sustainable, and sometimes certified, systems.

I also traveled around the Chiquitania region of Bolivia, characterized by its spectacular dry forest, hilly landscape and beautiful small towns that, in the eighteen century, formed part of the Jesuitical Missions. In the towns of San Ignacio, San Rafael, San Miguel and Concepcion I visited magnificent churches that are declared of World Heritage status by UNESCO. But the most remarkable memory I have from the Chiquitania region is the friendly people who work in the Asociaciones Sociales del Lugar (ASL).

ASLs are formed by local people who group themselves into any kind of association and ask for logging access in the Municipality forest reserves. The creation of ASLs by the 1996 Bolivian Forest Law provided a mechanism to involve the formerly illegal loggers in the new forestry system, and to begin regulating their logging activities by law. Workers in ASLs have more control of the forest and the forestry business than do logging crews working in a private concession. They have had experience in forest management, but at the same time they participate in other related activities such as agriculture.

During my stay in Bolivia, most of my travel was by bus, a long and tiresome experience. But being able to travel in dilapidated buses that were never on time is actually the best way of getting to see the countryside. Moreover, it is the most important means to getting to know the people and their culture.

You can get anything to eat before getting into the bus - chicken, beef, arepas, juices, cassava bread, fruits. And the smell of those product spreads in the bus gives one's trip a very special taste and flavor. I have never traveled in a bus where they carry out a ticket raffle. This was very colloquial and exciting. After everybody is seated in their assigned seats, the bus driver picks up the tickets and put them in a wooden box. He then asks the passengers in which order they want the winner to be chosen: the first, second or third place. Every time they made the raffle, all the passengers became very excited. Actually, so did I, but I never won a free bus ticket!

People in Santa Cruz are very fortunate because they possess one of the most diverse and vast extensions of tropical and dry forest in the tropics. And Bolivia is a great example to the rest of the world in their Natural Forest Management, with more than one million hectares of certified natural forests.

Local people have and an intimate relationship with their forest. For example, I was amazed to see that, evereywhere I went, there is much woodwork around Bolivian homes, including furniture, shelves, artifacts, and ornaments. I also visited the wood carving stores and had a wonderful opportunity to watch the artisans there turning solid pieces of wood into new pieces of carved art.

In the town of San Rafael de Velasco, I had an encounter with a famous local wood carver. He was in charge of carving the wooden posts of ceremonial kiosk in the central park of the town. Besides being a very good wood carver, he was a very interesting man. He was a history teacher in the main high school. So, while I was waiting for the delayed bus I got a magnificent class in Bolivian history, sitting under the shade of a Soto tree while my new friend carved away at his wooden renerding of the battle of Santa Ana.

Photo Gallery

Workshop with logging crews at La Chonta private forest concession.

Bulldozer operator loading a truck with huge logs of Yesquero blanco at La Chonta private forest concession.

Magnificent church typical of the Jesuitical Missions at San Miguel de Velasco.

Landing operators getting the logs ready to be sent down to the Saw Mill at La Chonta private forest concession.

A charcoal oven that the Asociacion Social del Lugar (AMAISAM) in San Miguel de Velasco built to convert all their wood waste into charcoal. They sell this charcoal to the Tin Mines in the department of Oruro.

A local high school teacher, also an expert wood-carver, creates a wooden "story-board". This depicts characters from the battle of Santa Ana. Such hardwood carvings are commonly used in the Chiquitania region as decorative items.