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A proposol for land use regulation of the Tunari national park south Vertient
I. Introduction
The Tunari National Park, TNP, is a regional institution responsible of taking care of an area declared as
Natural Protected Area in Cochabamba, Bolivia. Its main objective is the protection of its natural
resources and to plan its use. This park is different from other natural protected areas, particularly for its
biodiversity richness, its biomass production, its location inside an urban expansion area near and for its
traditional and recent exploitation pattern. The TNP is an important zone for recharge of underground
water, main source of water in the Central Valley and the city of Cochabamba.
During the last years there was an accelerated land occupation caused by urban settlements, causing a
variety of problems both in the TNP itself as well in the lower areas of the Cochabamba city and the
Central Valley.
Principal problems generated by the human settlements on the piedmont zone are:
- The impermeabilization of the underground water recharge zone, decreasing the available
irrigation water and thus directly affecting the Central Valley farmers.
- Flooding and landslides risks increased by the construction of new roads in south-north direction.
Obstruction and alteration of the water courses, causes that rain water to flow down with high
speed carrying out large amounts of materials that finally settles in the lowest part of the valley.
- While human settlements are being consolidated, new growth poles are generated that will cause
in the next few years an indiscriminate occupation of the park and, as a consequence, the loss of
natural resources and biodiversity, as it is becoming more and more evident.
- On the other hand, agricultural communities have been coexisting in equilibrium with their
natural environment at the park since long time ago. The deterioration of the natural
environmental conditions is dramatically altering their activities mainly due to the reduction of
the production area, and other added environmental problems such as: noise and particulate air
pollution, water and soil pollution, and various undesirable characteristics of uncontrolled human
activities.
- An aspect that is important to mention at this point, is the low level of income of people living in
the area. The decrease of the agricultural productivity has generated lower economic resources for
farmers causing an income deficit, which has to be compensated by selling their land. At the same
time a high land demand for urban land is becoming more evident, poor people buys agricultural
properties for dwelling purposes, and otherwise productive soil is split into many small
unproductive portions.
- As it was mentioned before, unplanned settlements affect the environment: water pollution
problem is maybe one of the most complicated to deal with, as illegal settlements do not have any
access to basic services, generating considerable large water pollution.
This situation represents a big challenge for the institutions directly involved with the park management.
Although many institutions are directly involved with the TNP management, there is a lack of projects
oriented to its preservation and its productive development.
Authorities of the departmental government of Cochabamba and their municipalities are aware of the
TNP problems and they have shown their willingness to solve them, although no precise regulation
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