During the early and mid-1990s, chainsaws bit into Bolivia’s northeastern department of Santa Cruz. As subsistence farmers and loggers cleared land in and around a national park, huge chunks of rainforest and gallery forest disappeared, and the habitat for rare river otters, black jaguars and tapirs shrank daily. Then in 1997, two environmental groups and three energy companies teamed up to save parkland forests as a way to capture carbon and contribute to the fight against global warming. The deal, conceived by the Bolivian government, the U.S.-based Nature Conservancy and Bolivia’s Friends of Nature Foundation (FAN), doubled the size of Noel Kempff Mercado National Park to 3.7 million acres (1.5 million ha) and involved investment of US$10.5 million. Some of the funds... [Log in to read more]
