Nature and Culture International

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of Our Work

Big News
Support For
New Reserve
in Ecuador

Biosphere Progress - One of the world’s most endangered ecosystems received a boost this autumn when the Ecuadorean Government and local municipalities announced they would seek the declaration of a new 780,000-acre Biosphere Reserve. read more...

Why we
Succeed

Nothing is more important to us than developing strong relationships with the people who live near our programs. And not just strong relationships—unshakable ones.read more ...

Help Us Save
20 Million
Acres By 2020

Over the past 10 years, we have saved 8.7 million acres at a net cost of $2.38 per acre. Now, we've set an ambitious goal to save 20 million acres of tropical forest by the year 2020. If we wait to act, these forests will vanish. Please help us achieve our goal.read more...

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"The program of Nature and Culture is powerful because it is grounded in two fundamentals: conservation is achieved acre by acre, and it is most effective and sustainable when it enhances not just the economic, but also the spiritual needs of those who inhabit the land." —E.O. Wilson

Accomplishments

Since 1996, Nature and Culture has ensured the protection of more than 8.7 million acres of imperiled ecosystems in Latin America. Our accomplishments include:

Protecting 5.5 million acres of Amazonian rainforest in Peru;
Spurring the creation of a 2.6 million-acre UNESCO biosphere reserve;
Helping indigenous Shuar communities regain rights to 80,000 acres of ancestral homeland;
Safeguarding the water supply for more than a million Ecuadorians;
Guiding the sustainable production of value-added goods such as perfume, artisanal crafts and forest products; and
Purchased over 100 properties to establish protected private reserves in key biodiversity sites.

Maijuna Regional Conservation Area

This new 970,000-acre reserve in northeastern Peru protects a vast area of Amazon rainforest wilderness, part of which is the ancestral home of the Maijuna people. The reserve was declared by the Loreto Regional government in February, 2012 to conserve both biological and cultural diversity. NCIs technical and financial support was instrumental in the declaration, which promotes a productive conservation model that supports local communities while saving biodiversity and combating the effects of change climate that threaten the survival of the Amazon and the planet.

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Nangaritza Valley Reserves Established

NCI has worked with local Shuar and campesino communities to create the Los Tepuyes community reserve in the Nangaritza valley of Ecuador, protecting some of the most scenic and highly biodiverse land in Ecuador. Recently in 2013 we also purchased 450 acres of foothill rainforest to extend this area along the river in the new Maycu reserve. This will provide a key link to preserve an intact forested corridor between the Andes of Podocarpus national park and the Amazon lowlands.

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Future Programs and Opportunities

During the rest of the decade, our major push will be to bring an even greater number of threatened tropical forests under protection. We’re calling it The 2020 Initiative, a program to grow the total number of acres we’ve saved to 20 Million by the year 2020.

Please join us in this rewarding and exciting work to save the miraculous diversity of life.

Featured projects include:

Escalera Regional Conservation Area

We are working with the government and the Shawi people to create the Shawi-Escalera reserve over a large area of the Amazon foothills of Peru. This would protect one of the most threatened but ecologically rich biomes in the world, the foothill forests that lie between the lowland rainforests and the highlands of the Andes. The rugged topography of this site means it has never been thoroughly investigated, and we expect new species to be discovered here. We hope to benefit the Shawi people and conserve an extraordinary transect of Andean foothill forest in the Peruvian Amazon.

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Cazaderos Reserve Land Purchase

NCI is seeking to purchase an additional 4,000 acres at only $100 an acre to expand our Cazaderos and Laipuna reserves in the endangered and highly biodiverse Tumbesian dry forest ecosystem of southwestern Ecuador and northern Peru. Tragically, the forests of this eco-region have been greatly reduced, and what little remains—barely 5% in Ecuador—is a top international conservation priority. The Cazaderos forest is in excellent condition, but this region is now threatened by increasing forest clearing for biofuels and other degradation activities.

Learn more…