Located in the Parana River between the states of Parana and Mato Grosso do Sol in Brazil,
Ilha Grande Park National, or Big Island National Park is almost 79,000 hectares.
It is now a national park, which is praised for its natural beauty and diversity.
The park is part of a larger complex ecosystem call the Parana River Biodiversity Corridor.
It is home to many unique habitats provided by the floodplains of the Rio Parana.
There are eight counties that comprise the island.
The park and the regions surrounding it were once home to many indigenous people and it
has a long history of use.
Until the mid 1990's most of the island was in use for agriculture such as crops and beef
cattle.
Here the conservation and the problems begin in 1994.
All the islands in Parana River the people would use to raise beef cattle.
The agriculture began in
the south part of the archipelago, near the big island.
you are here.
you know parks like Ivinhema.
But it begins here, here is the first area of protection.
Municipal protection area.
This area was created to take the cattle from the island because here in Brazil, the law
says that all the ocean area and the river area
is federal land.
It doesn't have any owners on this island.
So all the islands in the Parana River, they aren't anybody's but people use the land to
put cattle there to feed the cattle, to raise the cattle right?
And this was the first protection area created to take the cattle from the islands.
It was created with partners the municipality
with the states and I don't know how to translate it, the guys that take care of laws.
A type of lawyer but they are public servers that work looking for problems.
Yeah so, municipality with the state and the people that take care of environmental laws.
Very important conservation on the Parana river.
It begins here.
They start creating municipality protection areas and each time they become bigger and bigger.
First mosaic conservation and partnership.
For management in this area, we need to create an entity in Brazil exclusively for conservation.Many
municipalities choose together for conservation, they create one entity to take care of all
of the Island, so they call it consortia CORIPA.
Ilha Grande became a national park, officially on September 30, 1997.
This was a team effort between the environmental institute of Parana developed by IBAMA and
CORIPA.
It was created in 1998.
So they think about, oh now you have unit conservation and you need to think about what
you have the difference from Parana and Ivinhema.
So I think it's better now.
It's better, the conservation.
And I think the institute that works there to conserve, the public institute situation
there, are doing a good job to restore the unit.
The river and all about what happened the river and not only about the aquatic fauna
but the rest of the plants.
On their website you can find some of the specific objectives of the Ilha Grande unit
of conservation.
It specifically mentions that preserving the natural ecosystems are of great ecological
importance, and that this area has the specific objective of preserving, conserving, and improving
the ecological conditions of the park area and the well being of the population covered.
As well as preserving the last segment of the Rio Parana and associated ecosystems,
contributing to the maintenance of biological diversity, especially endemic and endangered
species of fauna and flora and their habitats, and archaeological sites.
In addition to contributing to the society, they want to add discussion, and make known
the processes of management and protection of natural resources among them the rational
use of soil and methods of environmental zoning.
The park is currently in a transition between the cerrado, which is a sort of tropical savannah,
and a seasonal forest.
The island is home to many endemic species and endangered species, including terrestrial
species such as the swamp deer, the alligator-of-crop-yellow or a type of caiman, the jaguar, a tapir,
and anteaters.
There is also Aquatic animal species such as painted fish, pacu.
Bird species such as jabiru.
jaó, Crax, American Spoonbill and jacana.
It is important to protect these species and their habitats because many of them are not
found elsewhere.
To maintain the biodiversity, the floodplain to maintain the ecosystem.
To preserve and conservation.
What is the importance of biodiversity?
What is important about biodiversity?
Right.
What do we want to conserve that?
Preserve that?
To maintain the ecosystem and function.
The ecosystem, the system.
Because the species has a role in the productivity and also the variability, genetic variability
is important to evolution.
So you need to preserve this part.
When you think about conserving a species the biodiversity also includes the genetic
variability, molecular differences and so on.
And the role of the species of the ecosystems.
So its important to maintain.
But maybe genetic variability, i think its now very important to evolution because evolution
is important to preserve the ecosystem also.
They change, climate changes, many things change so you need so you need some adaptive
scenarios.
Although it takes many partners and people to manage the park, it is officially administered
by the Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation also known as ICMBio.
The park is open free to the public for tours every day of the week, and at various locations
it has little beaches, and places of leisure and you can swim in the Rio Paraná.
Another option is the boat ride on the Parana River, passing through various localities
of the Big Island.
I found the support here, with all the colleagues here and that was amazing for me because all
the challenges become, how can i say, easier.
The challenges could be exciting sometimes, because we need challenge to grow, but we
can survive if the group is unified to the same objective.
I always say to my students that we cant do anything alone.
so the teamwork is the most important thing you can have in science.
You can think alone in your room, in your office, learn something from the books, but
scientific discussion I think, is the most productive scenario you can have.
So its really important.
So the team has impact, amazing impact.
What is your perceptive for the flood plains?
Our floodplains?
Here?
There?
Yeah, not so good I think, because although we have many efforts to conserve and parks
and conservation areas were created, we have impacts all the time there.
The dam, construction..
I think that hydro power is a commerce so it's difficult to evolve science with business.
Maybe its the, how can I say, the worst we can have.
If we didn't have the dams there, maybe things could be better.
But as it is, its difficult to say because we are always fighting against the hydro power
that are constructed there.
It could be better if we didn't have the hydro power there.
So the other thing is that its difficult to reach the population there, to communicate
scientific knowledge with the population there.
Most people don't care, it doesn't matter with the conservation, so that's a problem
I think.
So its important that we reach the young, because the new generation depends on them.
So if scientific knowledge is with them I think we can have some perspective, some good
perspective in the future.
Otherwise, I can't believe it.
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