HUMAN VOICES AROUND THE FOREST
Eugenio Vargas
(reprinted with permission from Monteverde Journal, vol. 2, no, 2,1995)share thoughts on the separate proposals pre-
sented by TSC and MCL for biological corridors
that encompass the San Luis and Guacimal rivers.
These thoughts arose from having grown up in the San
Luis community and from being a descendent of par-
ents and grandparents who supported their families
from the fruits of their work on this land since 1915.
Also, I helped my father plant hundreds of trees for
timber and fruit long before the reforestation program
of the MCL. A few years later, we picked the fruit of
these trees, and the first money I ever earned was sell-
ing oranges in Monteverde. For years, the subsistence
of the people of San Luis was based on the production
of beans, corn, coffee, plantain, milk, beef, and fruit and
on hunting. More recently, the history of San Luis has
been marked by the monopoly of the best agricultural
lands in few hands. Much of the destruction of the for-
ests and the soils was caused by the abuse by cattle and
by the fires set on these big farms. For over 25 years,
the people of San Luis have looked for help to achieve
a better distribution of the cultivable land, with an eye
to the growing population.
It is known only too well that the TSC and MCL
have carried out international campaigns to obtain
donations for buying land. The contributors to these
campaigns feel proud to save a piece of wilderness for
future generations. But in the case of San Luis, the
recent purchases by the TSC (the Jose Rojas farm) and
other ecotourism ventures have helped inflate land
prices to a level out of reach of any small farmer. As
a result, some feel resentful toward the conservation
groups, especially when rangers arrive at their farms
to tell them they cannot cut a tree to build a house or
for firewood and that hunting is forbidden even on
their own land.
On the other side of the coin, how can the reserves
grow so that the jaguar, tapir, and quetzal have more
space to move around? To create a biological corri-
dor, one needs control over the land, which is best
achieved by buying it. Although members of the MCL
and TSC have said the proposals do not require the
purchase of farms, it is hard to see how the organiza-
tions will avoid the temptation if they can afford to
do so and the owners are willing. Clearly, any farmer
would feel attracted to the idea of selling land, espe-
cially when he has passed many years working hard
under storms and droughts, without having a good
road or paid vacations, without a bonus or pension.
But is the message that farmers themselves cannot
conserve the land and its natural resources?
One can easily see how the fashionable slogans of
sustainable development and better quality of life are
used to attract more donations and more visitors and
to further expand the reserves, especially when Presi-
dent Figueres's government is applying this policy
with fireworks. What is left for the peasant farmer?
To convert from one day to the next into a tourism
impresario? Or perhaps to become a pawn of more
powerful business interests? Perhaps he can make a
living from the very air his forests produce. Don't we
still need the farmer who is proud to grow the food
that feeds his family and to sell the rest to the admin-
istrator, the professional, or the office worker who
does not plant the earth?
There should be more openness to the idea that the
communities near big reserves have the opportunity
to organize associations to manage small areas of for-
est communally with the help of the conservation
groups. These associations should have the power to
establish mechanisms so that income generated by
ecotourism stays in the community and is invested
in health, education, and agricultural credit associa-
tions. Several examples of such ventures already ex-
ist here (El Buen Amigo, La Bella Farm), and they
should receive support. Information must be commu-
nicated clearly and sincerely to the neighbors of pro-
tected areas because their support is as critical as the
support of foreign donors.Literature CitedAbramovitz, J. 1989. A survey of U.S.-based efforts to re-
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Costa Rica.
Atmetlla, A. 1995. Manual de instrumentos juridicos
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