Forests cared for by children in Bolivia

“Sometimes I would enter the jungle with my parents, but it was ugly and rather scary”, says Margarita Quete, a 12 year old girl from the Motacusal community, “but when the BONI project came along, community mothers and fathers got organized and gave us a piece of the forest for us to care for, they helped us with trail making and now we can wander all over because it is no longer dangerous and it is looks pretty too”, she explains.

Margarita is referring to the BONI project or Kids Forest, as it became known (from the original name in Spanish, Bosque de los Niños), an initiative conceived as an educational and development strategy for the community and for conservation intended for children inhabiting rural areas with the goal to readdress the value given to the Amazon Rainforest for its conservation and wholesome handling, while simultaneously promoting community awareness. The initiative is based on handing over a given forest space to children for them to handle and care for voluntarily and entirely.

The project began in Bolivia in 2006 by the Herencia NGO through the Tri-national Amazonian Program (PAT) involving Bolivia-Peru-Brazil, in the Curichón community, within the National Amazonian Wildlife Reserve of Manuripi, and in the year 2008 the experience was replicated in Motacusal, where Margarita lives and in other neighboring Amazonian communities as well. There are currently six forests under the designation of Kids Forest in the region: Monterrey, Palacio, Motacusal and Irak in Bolivia; and Bélgica and Vila Primavera in Peru.

Kids' Forests

The project wants to strengthen the elements that are a part of the Amazonian culture among indigenous people and peasants and relate them to the community’s wellbeing, as well as to the conservation of woodlands, in the words of the publication “The Kids Forest in the Bolivian Amazon, by Herencia and Care Bolivia”.

According to the publication, the inspiration for the project’s initial stages was the Kids Land program, executed in Peru by the Ania NGO, targeted at children belonging to the rural zone, “aiming at promoting the development of values and socio-environmental responsibility attitudes”. It consists of a physical space given over to children on the long term where they are the protagonists of its use, value and care, both regarding natural and cultural resources, as well as its sustainable development and they are acknowledged for this work.

The Kids Forest in Bolivia, on the other hand, is oriented towards developing “an education that can value life while building knowledge and skills in harmony with nature”, but it is not limited to education, explains Gilda Ticona, a Herencia technician, as it also promotes research, the handling of non-wood derived forest products, and it also emphasizes the strengthening of citizenship.

Reducing deforestation

According to Gilda Ticona, through BONI several benefits are promoted for the communities and therefore for the Amazon, such as the conservation of forests through the sustainable use of its resources, the reduction of deforestation, the diversification of produce, which is not focused on a single product. While on the social aspect, citizenship is strengthened, preparing future leaders, who, from early childhood, already take active part in the community. In Motacusal, “even the authorities are already getting involved in the methodology and its application, therefore community and municipal leaderships give more value to the riches each region has to offer”, says she.

The improvements are confirmed by José Hurtado, assuring that “the community before the devising of this Kids Forest was not organized, each family did their own work and performed activities without coordination with other families”, then the project began, and people began to unite and perceive their communities as a whole. Now, the entire community is involved, from parents to teachers, from leaders to children.

According to Herencia’s technician, the next steps are the consolidation of the different BONIs in the communities, which are beginning the process with support and motivation, aside from the experience learned before, “preparing children and personnel for self-management and the continuation of the project through sustainability”. Gilda believes that this sustainability can take place with the involvement of political and educational authorities, seeking its insertion in municipal budgets, converting its methodology into an educational policy and also through the sales of non-wood derived products produced in the Kids Forest.

Currently, Motacusal, a 20-family community seems to have changed into a school for the Kids Forest, tells us Margarita Quete, the little girl mentioned at the beginning of this article: “Now, kids from other schools and colleges come to our forest to learn what we do, and so we have yet another motivation to show off our Kids Forest”, ensures Margarita.

The secret to their success

According to Juan Fernando Reyes, director of the Herencia NGO, there are three fundamental elements in the Kids Forest: self-management, full forest management and collective well-being. He explains that self-management promotes in children a sense of community-oriented thinking, the capacity to govern oneself and social cohesion, and “implies in working and giving attention to children in the same way that one does to adults and getting them involved (fathers, mothers, teachers, authorities) in the Kids Forest”.

In Motacusal, for instance, children representing BONI are part of the highest local organization, the Community Council, and are heard by adults and by the community in their requests and considerations. “Our children know how to handle their own products and respect the living beings of the forest, and we – the parents – learn to give them value and obtain their natural resources without causing damages”, says José Hurtado, a chestnut gatherer and community leader.

Full forest management, on the other hand, encourages its handling as a whole, promoting the reassessment of its value through the use of its natural resources. Learning about and how to use these resources helps to change how the forest is perceived says one of Herencia’s publications, aside from promoting food safety through vegetable gardens or agro forest systems. This is confirmed by rural teacher Santiago Jofré, who says he had “an experience of learning and teaching about the importance of nature”, and now in his BONI children have a vegetable garden in which to plant with the help of their parents, where one can find cupuaçu, papaya and citric fruits.

Through collective well-being, social sharing is promoted, as well as an ethical relation with life and solidarity, such as within the BONI spaces or actions, such as with its social headquarters, the creation of vegetable gardens, the application of a garbage handling system and so forth. It is through these elements that BONI stands out from conventional development models, bringing material and spiritual development together, achieving a harmonious relationship between people and nature.