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Naturaleza y Cultura Ecuador

 

Organisation’s aim: NCE is part of Nature and Culture International (NCI), which works throughout South America. NCI’s overall mission is to conserve Latin America’s most extraordinary yet highly threatened ecosystems and cultures by saving endangered habitats, strengthening local capacity, and helping communities preserve their way of life.

 
 

Partner History

NCE works through local staff and with local governments and communities to conserve a wide range of natural ecosystems. These range from dry coastal forests to the rich cloud forests of the Andean mountains and the rainforests of the Amazon basin.

 

 
 

Partnership with WLT

Renzo Paladines, Director of NCE, was introduced to the World Land Trust (WLT) through a mutual partner, IUCN National Committee of the Netherlands (IUCN NL). He attended a symposium in 2009 entitled Payments for Ecological Services and Strengthening Memberships, held by WLT and IUCN NL in Brazil.

After discussing the benefits of teaming-up with NCE and similarities in their approach to protecting natural resources, NCE became an official WLT partner in 2010. The partnership encompasses land purchase, land protection through our Carbon Balanced scheme and funding for reserve rangers.

In February 2019, WLT launched an urgent appeal to help NCE extend a Water Protection Area to include the 70,000 acre range of the newly discovered and critically endangered Blue-throated Hillstar.

 
 

Other projects and activities

  • Forest protection programmes in the Tumbesian Dry Forest and Andean Cloud forests
  • Working with local communities to preserve cultural traditions and capacity building in the Upper Amazonian rainforest
  • Watershed protection by purchasing key areas to safeguard water supplies
  • Research projects in NCE’s San Francisco Scientific Station, studying many aspects of tropical forests
  • Environmental education, including training teachers in basic scientific research through the Schoolyard Ecology Program
 
 

Awards and Achievements

2013: In May, UNESCO declared Macizo de Cajas a Biosphere Reserve. NCE acted as the lead catalyst in creating this two million acre Biosphere Reserve, the first in the Ecuadorian Western Andes.

 
 

Contact Details

Executive Director: Renzo Paladines

Website: www.natureandculture.org