1. Introduction
This technical sheet initially arose with the intention of collecting as much information as possible about the different “systems” at the Latin American level on “incentives” for reforestation and forest management (production and protection).
program-in-forestry-incentives-in-dominican-republicAs always happens when advancing in the review of secondary literature and especially of the experience lived in Guatemala and Costa Rica on the success of the "forest incentive programs", it wishes to integrate the options it has in an analytical way and as summarized as possible. “Dominican Republic” to implement its own “forest incentives” program in the medium term .
It is worth noting that this is a first sketch of a future program of forestry incentives, which in fact I know is not new in terms of approach and if we consider the Project for the Management and Conservation of the Upper River Yaque del Norte Basin (PROCARYN), which raises a wide range of incentives not only for "reforestation" and / or "management" but also for other agro-productive areas.
But efforts developed isolated projects but beneficial in the sense of creating possible instruments and tools, such as directing on "lessons learned" new ways to improve systems and to own approach to financial incentives for development. The important thing is to consider that the Dominican Republic has a series of biophysical and geographical characteristics that overlaps it with other countries in the region, providing it with a series of “comparative advantages” at the forest level that are currently underutilized.
Renewable natural resources and particularly forest resources, in countries like the Dominican Republic, represent an option to satisfy needs and constitute one of the fundamental bases for the development of its inhabitants. Despite its importance, for different reasons it presents different states of deterioration, jeopardizing its renewal and the stability of the ecosystems it constitutes.
From this perspective, the need for State intervention in the conservation management of renewable natural resources is recognized, in order to guarantee the recovery and improvement of this base and allow its use for different purposes. A mechanism to promote changes in attitude or behavior around long-term activities such as the use, maintenance and improvement of forest resources, is the use of incentives, which must be granted in sufficient amounts and modalities to promote active participation of different actors linked to the resource and especially those who decide on the use of a land unit.
The use of incentives in the Dominican Republic, based on examples from countries such as Chile, Costa Rica, Bolivia and Guatemala, will allow:
- take advantage of, improve and enhance the availability of lands and soils for forest vocation without substitute uses; the employment of unemployed or underemployed labor; increase the number of rural forestry jobs and thereby strengthen the rural management approach; restore the hydrological-forest function and thereby contribute to the regulation of the hydrological cycle and the generation of other environmental services (soil conservation, water quality, carbon fixation, among others); and generate forest conglomerates and from these the development of the forestry industry. With the positive national and regional impact generated by the existence of these plantations, the possibility of obtaining goods and environmental and social benefits linked to them will be consolidating.
The Forest Incentives Program (PIF-RD) is an instrument of the long-term National Forest Policy, to be promoted by the state through the " National Forest Service", with a view to promoting the promotion of sustainable forest production in the country, by encouraging investment in afforestation, reforestation and natural forest management activities. It responds to an emergency to promote reforestation and forest management through cash payments to those owners, individual or communal, who decide to invest in productive forestry activity. In exceptional cases, forestry activity is encouraged for protection purposes. Indirectly, the State is channeling financial resources, in compensation for goods and services derived from forestry.
To conclude this technical sheet is dedicated to the "current presidential forestry advisor" of the Dominican Republic, Eng. Bernabé Mañon and his esteemed wife Mrs. Marisela De Mañon, hoping to contribute with this document to outline actions that strengthen the role of the "forest sector ”In the Dominican Republic .
goals
- Structuring a conceptual proposal that allows orienting actions that in the medium term can become a national program of forest incentives, aimed at reforestation, management and forest protection; Consider that the future implementation of a Forest Incentives Program in the Dominican Republic (PIF-RD), its implementation is not only based on environmental aspects, the true sustainability of the program as it has been demonstrated in other Latin American countries is based on the change of culture and above all on demonstrating the economic viability of the forest; generic information, instruments and management tools to guide forest resource managers and planners in the Dominican Republic
