Welcome
Natura International is dedicated to conserving rainforests and habitat in Latin America through bottom-up efforts led by local initiatives. We work with communities and governments, particularly at the state and regional level, to conserve land, protect watersheds and ecosystem services, and promote sustainable livelihoods in local communities linked to those efforts.
Our efforts focus in Argentina, where Natura Argentina is working to create or assist in the creation of several major protected areas, and in Bolivia where Natura Bolivia has created over 1 million acres of protected areas and are working to create several million acres more.
Byron Swift, President
byronswift@naturainternational.org
Argentina
In Argentina, Natura International is composed of a team of six professionals based in the city of Córdoba, in Cordoba province. Natura Argentina is focusing its work on the creation of major protected areas in four regions:
- The Nevados de Castilla in Salta province would conserve 375,000 acres of cloud forests and puna grasslands with charismatic species;
- The Uspallata valley of Mendoza, which would become the province’s first national park of 375,000 acres that also protects the capital’s water source;
- The Sierra of Famatina, an area of spectacularly beautiful Andean ecosystems in La Rioja province, with a potential size of 225,000 acres;
- The Ansenuza lake (Mar Chiquita) and associated wetlands, which harbors extraordinary concentrations of water birds and aquatic resources, with a potential size of over 1 million acres.
Our ethic is one of bottom-up conservation that emphasizes:
- intense work with local communities;
- interactions with authorities and organizations at local and national levels; and
- conducting the scientific fieldwork to support our conservation programs.
In Argentina Natura also works on identifying the biological values of wildlands and roadless areas as a basis for protecting key ecosystems, and works closely with other conservation groups, including Aves Argentinas in its effort to support the government in creating the Traslasierras and Ansenuza protected areas in Cordoba.
