100,000 Hectare National Park to protect Colombia’s Rare Wildlife & Indigenous Peoples

August 2007. The government of Colombia has created the new Serrania de los Churumbelos Auka Wasi National Park designed for the protection of one of the greatest areas of biodiversity in the country, inhabited by such rare and endangered animals as the Andean bear, jaguar, puma and tapir. The new park stretches from the lowlands of the Amazon Basin to the slopes of the Andean Mountains, covering 97,180 hectares.

 

The Churumbelos mountainous area is recognized for its great biodiversity. Some 30 species of amphibians and 16 species of reptiles live in the newly protected area as well as more than 140 species of butterflies, and 825 species of plants.

WWF participated in the process that led to the declaration of the new park and will help implement the management plan, which includes the promotion of conservation and sustainable development in and around the newly protected area.

‘The new park significantly increases the network of protected areas that are so important for the conservation of Andean and Amazon ecosystems,’ said Luis Germán Naranjo, WWF-Colombia’s ecoregional conservation director.

This new protected area will be a valuable opportunity to conserve and to consolidate the culture of the indigenous communities, the Inga and Yanaconas, and to assist them in the recovery of their cultural practices, Naranjo said.

It is believed that the Andaqui ethnic group lives in voluntary isolation from modern societies at the headwaters of the Forge and Mandiyaco rivers in the Churumbelos mountains. The creation of the national park protects the territory occupied by this ethnic group, under the precautionary principle, Naranjo added.