Status Update on Guyana Forests

In November 2007, Guyana’s President, Bharrat Jagdeo, offered to place most of Guyana’s standing tropical rainforest under the control of a British-led international body in exchange for development and technical assistance towards becoming a green economy. This is no meager offer: Guyana retains nearly 80 percent of its original forest cover, roughly 16 million hectares.

Details of the President’s initiative have been developing since he initially announced it, but the core of his offer still stands. Compared to the alternative of offering the forests up to extractive industries for quick monetary gains, the impact for the world could be huge. According to Conservation International, the burning and clearing of tropical forests emits at least one-fifth of total greenhouse gases that cause climate change; more than all of the world’s cars, trucks and airplanes combined.

President Jagdeo has said he hopes his offer will help “create incentives to reward the conservation of existing forest and support our communities with new economic development alternatives for the 21^st century.”

One such emerging form of economic development surrounding the world’s remaining tropical forests is ecosystem services, which can be divided into four categories: Supporting (nutrient cycling, soil formation); Provisioning (food, freshwater, wood, fiber); Regulating (climate regulation, flood control, water purification); and Cultural (aesthetic, spiritual, educational).

In 2008, Guyana’s Iwokrama International Centre for Rainforest Conservation and Development – a million-acre rainforest reserve located in the heart of the Guiana Shield that is used for research, ecotourism, and sustainable forest management – and the UK investment house Canopy Capital announced a deal that is laying the groundwork of a system that will allow financial markets to price the ‘utility value’ of rainforests through their ecosystem services.

While international economists and climate change leaders discuss new business opportunities surrounding the preservation of rainforests, Guyana is also keeping its eyes on further developing one sector that is already a well-known money-generating ecosystem service: ecotourism. Outside of extractive industries, tourism by its very nature is one of the most environment-dependent industries. Of course not all tourism is done in a sustainable manner, but more travelers are choosing their destination based on its eco or sustainable tourism options. And within Guyana, the draws for tourists are many.

Besides the rainforests, which includes part of the Guiana Shield – 2.5 million square kilometers that is the world’s largest remaining tract of mostly undisturbed rainforest – there are exotic mangroves, wild coastal swamps, rugged Atlantic beaches, lofty mountain ranges and sprawling savannas that are as inspiring in their vastness as the rainforests are for their claustrophobia-inducing density.

Pristine ecosystems and a remarkable diversity of flora and fauna (including many species that are threatened and endangered elsewhere – jaguars, harpy eagles, giant anteaters, and giant river otters among them) that includes more than 225 species of mammals, 880 species of reptiles and amphibians, 815 species of birds and 6,500 species of plants. Guyana also has welcoming Amerindian communities, unpretentious ecolodges, some of the world’s best Neotropical birdwatching, and an emerging catch-and-release fishing sector.

With a population of roughly 760,000 people that are mostly clustered along the Atlantic coast – a mere five percent of the landmass – Guyana’s 83,000 square miles (comparable in size to Idaho) are virtually unpopulated and undeveloped. Guyana is essentially one of the world’s most unspoiled natural wilderness areas.

Guyana is also becoming recognized for a growing community tourism movement. Several of Guyana’s Amerindian villages, especially in the Rupununi Savanna, have been at the forefront of developing sustainable tourism products. By bringing ecotourism into their communities, it encourages locals to conserve and protect their natural lands and heritage. It also provides alternate employment options to more environmentally damaging (and common) jobs in areas such as logging, mining and the wildlife trade.

Surama, an idyllic village set amongst an enticing mix of savanna and jungle covered mountains, has long been the role model for community tourism in Guyana. The Surama Eco-Lodge and their tourism ethos and products – village tours, birdwatching trips, mountain treks, jungle walks, dugout canoe trips, wildlife spotting – were recently named the 2009 Responsible Tourism Showcase Honoree by the Educational Travel Community.

The recognition is deserved. The Surama Eco-Lodge and all tours in and around Surama are managed and operated solely by the local Makushi Amerindians. Of the village’s population of 300, more than 70 are employed through tourism. About 60 percent of the community’s income is now sustainably generated through tourism-related activities, with 75 percent of village households reporting tourism as a source of income. For Amerindian villages like Surama, and Guyana in general, tourism couldn’t be economically feasible without the rainforests.

President Jagdeo is currently heralding what is possibly the largest-ever carbon offset program in an effort to preserve Guyana’s forests while still allowing for economic growth in Guyana. People around the world are beginning to listen to Guyana’s forests, and tourism can be their voice. Through ecotourism, people can speak of the forest’s biodiversity, its cultures, its indigenous inhabitants, its ecosystem services, and the current efforts that are being implemented to preserve them.

Developing countries with remaining forests that can be used to fight climate change are very few, mainly because history has shown that the market will always win. The monetary gains that can be realized by razing forests for timber, farm lands or for valuable minerals is a powerful force. Guyana is in a unique position to change this and become a leader in a new business opportunity that creates revenues while focusing on a greater good for everybody, including adventurous travelers.

For more information on tourism in Guyana, visit www.guyanabirding.com and www.guyana-tourism.com.

Kirk Smock is the author of the Guyana guidebook published by Bradt Travel Guides, and Senior Writer for the Guyana Sustainable Tourism Initiative, a joint project of the Guyana Tourism Authority and the United States Agency for International Development/Guyana Trade and Investment Support project.