The Mesoamerican Biological Corridor (MBC) is a region that includes Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, and some southern states of Mexico. This area connects South America to North America, which is important for animals that travel through it during migration. Because of the many different types of habitats, Mesoamerica is home to between 7% and 10% of all known species worldwide.
The corridor was first suggested in the 1990s to help animals move freely across the Americas without stopping human activities or land use, while helping the environment stay healthy. The Mesoamerican Biological Corridor is divided into four parts: Core Zones, Buffer Zones, Corridor Zones, and Multiple-Use Zones. Each part allows different amounts of human activity.
Background
As more natural tropical areas are changed into farms and used for human activities, people are becoming more worried about protecting local wildlife. Mesoamerica is one of many places around the world with high levels of plant and animal life, but many species there are at risk of disappearing. This area is the third largest biodiversity hotspot on Earth. Some efforts have been made to protect wildlife in the region, but many protected areas are small, broken into pieces, separated from each other, or not well protected.
In the late 1980s, Archie Carr III proposed a plan to help protect animals and plants in the region by connecting broken pieces of habitat and creating areas around protected lands that allow different types of land use. The corridor that was created later became known as Paseo Pantera, which means "Path of the Panther" in Spanish, and it runs along the Atlantic coast.
The Mesoamerican Biological Corridor (MBC) started in the late 1990s with funding from the World Bank to help protect wildlife, especially species found only in the region that are in danger of disappearing, and to find ways to use land in a way that does not harm the environment. Scientists from the University of Florida and the Central American Commission on Environment and Development (CCAD) helped develop the corridor. Later, CCAD, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and the Global Environment Facility (GEF) remapped the corridor for political reasons. From 1990 to 1995, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) provided $4 million to support the corridor. In 1992, all countries in the Mesoamerican Biological Corridor joined the Central American System of Protected Areas (SICAP), which lets each country keep control of its own environmental policies. The corridor has helped protect wildlife habitats, but many species are still in danger because of broken habitats and uneven protection across the region. The MBC was officially supported during the 19th Summit of Central American Leaders in Panama in 1997.
Ecosystems
The Mesoamerican Biological Corridor includes many different types of environments. It is located between the Caribbean Sea on the east and the Pacific Ocean on the west. The Guatemalan Mountain range divides the corridor into two parts. This mountain range has active volcanoes. These natural features create four types of land environments and 19 land regions. The environments include tropical dry broadleaf forests, tropical wet broadleaf forests, xeric shrub lands, and tropical coniferous forests.
Land use
In 2003, about 57% of the Mesoamerican Biological Corridor was covered in natural vegetation. The rest of the land was mostly used for raising cattle and growing crops. The main crops grown in the corridor include sugarcane, corn, coffee, and beans. Because agriculture is a major part of the countries’ economies, there is a strong focus on using farming methods that protect the environment.
The Mesoamerican Biological Corridor has four areas: Core Zones, Buffer Zones, Corridor Zones, and Multi-Use Zones. Each area has different rules about how people can use the land. Core Zones are protected areas that help keep plants and animals safe, which supports the health of ecosystems and benefits local communities. Buffer Zones are the lands around Core Zones and are mostly wild areas. Corridor Zones are the paths between different areas that connect water and land, helping plants and animals move freely. Multi-Use Zones separate wild and protected areas from lands used for farming, logging, and other human activities. Around 10.7% of Mesoamerica is currently protected to help conserve biodiversity.
Conservation efforts
The Mesoamerican Biological Corridor is a program that connects protected areas into one large area that works well for conservation. Its goal is to help connect protected areas across regions to support both nature and people's lives. The purpose of the corridor is to show that protecting nature is a job that many people and groups work on together. One problem with conservation efforts is that governments and politics change across the corridor, causing protected areas to be broken up. Up to 40% of protected areas are not properly protected because they cross borders between countries. The quick growth of human populations harms conservation. Even though this growth has led to more cities, most people in the MBC still live in rural areas and rely on natural resources for survival. This reliance has caused overuse of resources that is hard for governments and conservation groups to measure and control.
As of 2010, SICAP (Central American System of Protected Areas) includes 669 protected areas covering 124,250 square kilometers. However, conservation is made harder by broken-up land areas and disagreements between countries. Most protected areas are about 18,400 hectares in size, while only 18 areas are larger than 1,000 square kilometers. Today, most conservation efforts focus on helping communities live in ways that protect nature and reducing harm caused by cutting down forests. Deforestation in the Mesoamerican Biological Corridor was highest between the 1970s and the 1990s. Planting native trees is the main way to fix ecosystems after forests are destroyed.
Controversy
When the Mesoamerican Biological Corridor was being planned, there were no clear functions proposed. The people involved did not know exactly what the MBC was meant to do, which caused frustration and made the project take longer to complete. The MBC was first planned to protect endangered wildlife by connecting broken pieces of habitats and creating buffer zones to reduce human use of land. However, many people involved wanted the corridor to also address common problems like pollution, poor water and sanitation, pesticide use, collecting firewood, and controlling diseases that spread from animals to humans. In the end, the main goals of the corridor were set to help animals move freely across the Americas without stopping human activities, while supporting ecological health. Indigenous people were not included in these decisions, and the boundaries of the corridor were decided without their input. This lack of involvement caused distrust and conflict between local communities and those working on the corridor.
To support ecological health, landowners are sometimes paid for environmental services that help protect the land, such as reforestation. A big problem with these programs is that many small landowners do not have legal proof of land ownership. These small landowners often received land to farm on large farms or settled in areas without official ownership. Without legal documents, they cannot access many land use incentives, so they rarely consider the long-term effects of their actions on the land. Another problem is that the programs do not treat small and large landowners differently. To reduce carbon emissions, the MBC offers rewards for creating carbon sinks. Large landowners have used this system by planting African Oil Palms, which give them more carbon credits. In contrast, small landowners who protect forests receive very few or no carbon credits.