Communities and concessions
SAN FRANCISCO — One of the strangest things about Guatemala is how close it is to the US. And how easy to leave. In our plane, we effortlessly crossed the border where Mexico tries to keep the Guatemalans out, then cleared the wall the US is building to keep the Mexicans out. Just four [...]
A visit to Beef National Park
LAGUNA DEL TIGRE NATIONAL PARK, Guatemala — The sign announcing the entrance to Laguna del Tigre National Park is large and impressive. The problem is, that’s about the only visible sign that you’re entering a “core protected area” of a massive national wilderness preserve.
We traveled about five hours by four-wheel-drive pickup truck on drenched dirt [...]
On patrol with Guatemalan environment officials and soldiers
LA PASADITA, Guatemala — The signs were all there: tree stumps, hastily constructed barbed-wire fences and stray cattle. All that was missing was the perpetrator — or perpetrators — of this all too common environmental crime.
About 45 hectares of forestland had been burned, replaced by corn plots and tall grasses, with a few cattle scattered [...]
Sustainable forest agriculture spawns its own verb
UAXACTÚN, Guatemala — Everyone in this village down a muddy, rutted road, 23 km past the world-famous Maya archaeological site of Tikal, knows how to “xatear.”
The verb, which would stump most Guatemalans, means “to cut xate,” a decorative plant used in floral arrangements in the United States and elsewhere.
Making concessions
FLORES, Guatemala — Today we interviewed Juan Trujillo of Rainforest Alliance, current acting mayor of Carmelita, former president of the Carmelita forest concession. Trujillo describes himself as a skeptic-turned-believer in the concessions concept over the 11-year evolution of Carmelita’s concession. The concession, with its assembly, committees and elected leaders, is a much a [...]