• Economy
• Ecuador

Quito, Jul 24 (EFE).-

Ecuador has established itself as a pioneering country in sustainable production, free of deforestation with coffee and cocoa as its flagship products. The South American nation has opened markets in the European Union (EU) by demonstrating that their farmers have avoided the clearing of thousands of hectares of Amazon rainforest.

With more than 93,000 hectares dedicated to coffee, cocoa, oil palm, and livestock (the four legal activities that most negatively impact the Ecuadorian Amazon), the country has turned to sustainable production by avoiding the deforestation of more than 86,000 hectares for new crops.

Italy and Belgium have received the first shipments of coffee and cocoa from Ecuadorian plantations that have not been previously deforested. The initiative forms part of the PROAmazonia and Pago Por Resultados programs, developed under the international mechanism for Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+).

So far Italian firm Lavazza has purchased 34.5 tons of coffee and will present in Turin (Italy) on September 30 the first brand of deforestation-free coffee. Meanwhile, Belgian company Silva Cacao has bought 10.8 tons of cocoa.

“The characteristics of the coffee and the way the crops are cultivated means Lavazza can set a higher price than for coffee from Colombia or Peru,” said the president of the Southern Ecuador Associations of Small Ecological Coffee Growers Regional Federation (Fapecafes), Víctor Yanangómez.

93% less deforestation

Ecuador is the first country to receive international funding from REDD+, said Ángel Sandoval, Undersecretary for Climate Change at Ecuador’s Ministry of Environment, Water and Ecological Transition.

The ministry and Ecuador’s Ministry of Livestock and Agriculture developed the PROAmazonia program (2017-2023), with technical support from the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

“People do not deforest for pleasure, it is out of necessity. If someone who lives in the rural area needs to expand their crops or pastures to improve their well-being and that of their family, they are going to continue to do so, and the best thing we can do is to give them alternatives,” Sandoval said.

To this end, training programs were held for more than 16,000 farmers who improved productivity by 24% and increased income by 42% between 2021 and 2023, leading to a 93% reduction in deforestation in the affected areas.

In addition, US$2.3 million in 360 loans were granted (41 % to women), with the option of lower interest rates if they met deforestation-free goals.

Reference in Latin America

For the third consecutive year, Ecuador is “the country with the best results and the highest organic production in the world,” said Nelson Yépez, Undersecretary of Marketing at the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock.

To acknowledge the results, it has been proposed that the country is considered a benchmark in this area in Latin America. In September, Quito is to host the First Regional Workshop on Sustainable Production Free of Deforestation, with representatives from Brazil, Costa Rica, Peru, and Colombia, among other countries, participating.

In this regard, for the head of the UNDP Environment and Energy Area in Ecuador, Mónica Andrade, the key to success has been inter-institutional cooperation and a shared vision. Different players came together in 2009 to develop a vision for the country, which has made it “a worldwide pioneer.”

The Pago Por Resultados project, financed by the Green Climate Fund (GCF), has picked up the baton to take the strategy national. The aim is to impact other Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), such as poverty reduction, forest conservation, and gender equality. EFE

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Agencia EFE received support from UNDP for the preparation of this article.