Forests for the benefit of all

Yavesía regained control over their forests thanks to more than 2,500 hours of collective work in only one year. Many other communities took over their land through assemblies and establishing common strategies to negotiate with the federal government. Ixtlán constantly has 20 people fulfilling their forest protection cargos. It is also thanks to the system of uses and customs that 78 per cent of Oaxacan territory is communal nowadays. Communities cannot sell their land, and there is no individual owner. Overall, Mexico is a pioneering country in Community Forestry Management. Forests in the country are assets for community development.

As the communities already experienced the destruction of their environment in the past, they pay close attention to nature and have a long-term business approach instead of focusing on immediate profit without considering the future costs. "We live in our forests, but not only because it gives us income. It also provides us with air, shade and food that can be found in the forest. We take the forest as ours, we live off it, and we take care of it," says Artemio Vargas, a former president of Secretariat of Common Goods in Ixtlán de Juárez. "The community always had a perspective of not exhausting our natural resources to have them in our future," Mauro Hernández, also from Ixtlán, adds and expresses the attitude of many communities in Sierra Juárez.

Uzachi - together and educated

Centuries-old Montezuma cypresses provide shade from the burning sun. The variety of insects under our feet suggests a healthy ecosystem. Water running through the surrounding oak and pine forests sounds close by, and when we look at the creeks, the water is crystal clear. Capulálpam de Méndez, with its 4000 hectares of forests has become an example of sustainable forest management where people from all around the world come to gain inspiration and knowledge.

The territory of Capulálpam, like many other communities that decided to live off their forests, is divided by the Secretariat of Common Goods into various areas. In Capulálpam, they have a sustainable forestry area, protected areas, agricultural areas as well as a watershed protected area. The local community companies use the natural resources of different areas to create benefits for the community. Fresh, clean water from the forests is put into bottles in a tiny water filling factory. A forestry company takes care of the forests, and a sawmill processes the wood. And the protected areas are used for eco-tourism activities.

In 1992, Capulálpam and four other communities in the region united under the Unión de Comunidades Productoras Forestales Zapotecos-Chinantecos. It is an organization providing advice, education, and technical support in forest management. In the beginning, communities did not have experience with forest management, and they also lacked people educated in that field. Right after they gained their forests back, they started to send their youth to study forestry and other related courses at the universities. Especially in the case of Capulálpam, finding experts was a challenge as the village has lived off mining for a very long time. Nowadays, Uzachi is full of experts.

The four communities follow ten-year-long plans of forestry activities based on precise observation of the forests of each community - including camera traps that Uzachi is managing to monitor the local fauna, monitoring the water, monitoring of hydrocarbons in the ground etc. The organization proposes plans, and the Secretariat of Common Goods of each community approves them. While Uzachi is a technical advisor, community companies are in charge of implementing the approved plans. All the communities have their forests certified under the Rainforest Alliance.

In the area designated to sustainable forestry, Capulálpam tried an approach that was first criticized by the government Secretariat of Environment and Natural Resources (SEMARNAT), that has to approve decisions of the communities.

"We experimented with cutting off an entire area of trees. We got rid of everything, and the authorities did not like that. Still we did all our work well, and now we can see the results: young, vigorous forests," explains Miguel Ramírez Domínguez, who is currently a chairman of the Board of Directors of the organization Uzachi.

After logging, the forest management company plants new trees to reforest and create green barriers to prevent erosion. Such an approach demands a lot of treatment of the forest, including thinning the area various times a year. The treatment becomes more complicated with climate change. "Because of the changing climate, we now have a new plague that hasn’t been here before. We have fumigated with organic materials twice so far because if you put chemicals, you destroy all the wilderness that is there," Ramírez Domínguez admits. “The forest is like a body, you need to heal it if it becomes old or sick," he states.

Another consequence of climate change is postponed reforestation. "Normally, we would have new trees planted already, but because of the lack of rain, we could not proceed with the reforestation. We plant trees during the rainy season so that the plants can grow," adds Isaias Guillermo Jiménez Pérez, a representative of Santiago Xiacui community at Uzachi. And so in July, they are still waiting for the first rain...

A magical town

Have you ever walked barefoot in a forest? "It is not the same to walk in the city, on a concrete sidewalk," says Vladimir Gildardo Arreortúa Martínez who is in charge of the community company of eco-tourism. If you visit Capulálpam, you can get a guide at the company that will take you on a barefoot walk where you will learn everything about herbs and trees that grow in the forest and animals that live there.

Or imagine emerging yourself into a temazcal - a dark, steam sauna where all kinds of different herbs from a nearby forest fill the air, and you can calmly relax and let your body heal just like the Zapotecs have been doing for centuries. A ritual in a steam sauna is one of the offers in Capulálpam's various centres of traditional medicine where visitors can also get massages or experience a ritual of cleaning one's body and spirit.

Capulálpam de Méndez is on the list of Magical Towns. This project of the Mexican government recognizes certain towns across the country for their “magical” qualities. It might be their natural or architectural wonders, rich history, or extraordinary legends. It also means extra support from the government for the development of tourism.

In Capulálpam, community members, through collective work and government finances, constructed sixteen cottages for the community eco-tourism company, each of them with a fireplace and views to the forest or the valleys around. Through the eco-tourism the company gives employment to about 15 people, including guides and people working in the offices. Other employment positions were created indirectly, as other villagers also opened up their hotels, cabins and restaurants.

Apart from benefiting from employment opportunities, community companies that generate profit also support social projects in the village. "For example, when there is a celebration approaching, presidents from all community companies meet at the secretariat that they report to, and say how much we can contribute to the organization of the party. For the upcoming celebration, the eco-tourism company is buying fireworks," Arreortúa Martínez gives an example.

Courageous approach with biodiversity in mind

With its almost 20,000 hectares of forests, Ixtlán de Juárez has logging and reforestation activities at one-fourth of its territory. "Our territory spreads from 100 meters to 3100 meters above sea level. There is enormous ecosystem diversity: deciduous forest, mesophyll forest, oak-pine forests and areas of high conservation value," states Artemio Vargas from Secretariat of Common Goods.

With a population twice the size of Capulálpam, Ixtlan’s Secretariat of Common Goods manages seven community companies. Apart from eco-tourism and water purification, the community also established a gas station. Within forestry, Ixtlán was able to create the whole chain from taking care of the forests and protecting the environment, through logging, processing wood, to making furniture and selling it in their  showroom.

The sawmill of Ixtlán, together with its furniture company, are located at one end of the village. You can also find a large nursery there. "We have perhaps a million, or a million and a half plants ready for reforestation. We do not need them all, so other communities also benefit from the nursery," Artemio Vargas says.

Ixtlán also cleans a certain area of the forest completely and lets the seeds in the soil do their work naturally while supporting the process of reforestation. "We can already see the results of the forests that were treated this way in 2014. We have a more diverse forest there, the results are impressive," Vargas says as Ixtlán also had to defend this approach to forest management against SEMARNAT.

Currently, about 40 per cent  of the areas for sustainable forestry is being managed by this approach. "We have been careful about leaving biological corridors so that the animals from those ecosystems do not migrate to other places. We have observed that a lot of new plants grow in the places thanks to this method; many were not there before. A lot of animals come to eat them," Vargas continues.

In 2000, community enterprises in Ixtlán were certified by SmartWood, a U.S.-based global forestry certification program sponsored by the RainForest Alliance.

Competing with corporations

Having control over every part of the chain gives Ixtlán an opportunity to make a profit from various activities and to sell wood at a higher price when it is made into furniture. First, the sawmill sells the wood to the furniture factory and then the factory searches for a market for its products. One of the challenges is a limited capacity of staff. "We do not have a sales person who would be able to search for independent business opportunities. This year, we reached out again to the state government, and luckily, they hired us to make furniture for some schools. But these are contracts that we benefit from six to eight months, not more," Mauro Hernández states. The company is currently considering opening a branch in Oaxaca City. However, that would take away one feature from the company, which is creating community employment.

In general, community companies have hard times competing with profit-oriented companies. Taking care of the environment in order to have certified wood as well as the right place for life needs a lot of investment. "They want to compete with capitalist companies? They cannot win. Why? Because their costs are very different; they work in natural forests, they distribute their income to the community, and the wood is cheap. Mexico is open to cheap wood from Chile, Brazil, China," explains Mario Fuente, an expert on ecological economics and rural development at the University of Sierra Juárez.

"They need to find a different market," he suggests.

On the other hand, representatives of communities in the Sierra Juárez state complain that the Mexican government treats community companies like any other companies when it comes to taxes, without taking into consideration their social impact. Part of the profit of community companies goes back to the businesses. Another part of it is used for forest preservation, and the third part usually goes to the community, either for social projects, education activities or celebrations.

"It has been a problem that we have been fighting for the last ten years. Communities ask for a different deal in terms of taxes as we support the construction of schools. Our conservation work also helps to maintain water resources for the whole municipality," Artemio Vargas explains. A lot of materials that he buys directly in the community cannot be deducted for tax purposes: "Some suppliers still do not have internet, they are not able to provide an invoice". Vargas says that the communities even took that issue to the National Supreme Court, but they were not successful. "Our end goal is not economical, it is social. The money we earn is not for only one person, it is for all,” the former president of the Secretariat of Common Goods in Ixtlán de Juárez adds.

Yavesía - untouched forests

For the benefit of all, and mostly for future generations, Santa María Yavesía decided not to exploit their forests. Out of 283 communities with forest areas in Oaxaca, 85 have established locally controlled forest enterprises.

Alejandro Pérez Hernández is normally shy, but when the conversations turn to nature, his eyes shine like those of a kid standing underneath a Christmas tree. When he walks through the forests in Yavesía, he looks as if he was meditating. Stepping carefully, one step after another, watching the environment constantly changes as the biodiversity is immense. Within the hour-long walk up the hill, one can observe multiple microhabitats. Different trees, sounds of birds, rare plants we have never seen before but Alejandro knows them all. "Almost all the plants can be consumed, but you need to be careful about quantities as some of them have different levels of toxicity," the tall man says.

"We have an incredible variety of mammals here. Anywhere in the world you would not be able to see an aquatic rat that lives here. It is like a kangaroo and an otter at the same time. It has a mouth like an otter, very big moustaches, very small little hands like a kangaroo, but huge legs and a tail almost the size of its body," Alejandro explains excitedly, trying to portray the animal with his hands.

Alejandro has grown up here, and even though he lived in the U.S. for some time, he does not want to leave Yavesía anymore. When asking about Yavesia's reasons not to cut trees, there are two reasons most villagers state. First, they have been living from fruit trees and have never been dependent on wood from the forest. "We do not exploit the forests because the water in the river would go scarce similarly to other villages that do so," Alejandro states the second reason.

Yasaias Peréz Cruz, who is in charge of the local eco-tourism has a more spiritual explanation: "The mountain is sacred, and that is why we are taking care of it."