 I want to welcome you to what we hope is the first joint forestry fisheries webinar on resilient rivers counting fish from forests. I want to begin with two technical points. First, your program is being simultaneously translated in Spanish and in English. So to select your preferred language, use the small globe icon to the bottom right of your Zoom screen. We're asked to let you know that if the audio quality deteriorates, as can happen in a remote environment, interpretation will be impossible for a brief moment. The interpreters will let you know, and they will resume interpretation as soon as the sound quality permits. Due to the large turnout, we are not including a Q&A session, but we're really encouraging all our participants to make comments and ask questions in the chat. Our panelists will do their best to answer the questions after their presentation. We thank Mr. Bruno Paz for his assistance with translation in the chat, and we look forward to a very lively discussion there. Freshwater systems, including forests and fish, are at the heart of every functioning landscape across the world. Rivers, in fact, connect all living things from the mountain ridge tops to the coral reefs, and that makes sustainable management a wicked problem. That's a problem that's difficult, but I don't believe in this case impossible to solve because of competing demands, shifting needs, and incomplete data. And the only solution to a wicked problem is true collaboration. So not just redistributing the workload or coordinating definitions, but accomplishing together far more than the sum of what could have been accomplished individually. It seems you agree. In the survey we circulated with the webinar announcement, 64% of you responded that collaboration across forestry and fisheries was not just useful, but in fact was essential for achieving the SDGs. Only 12% of you frequently observe such collaboration, and in fact, most of you rarely observe it. So today we have it. With that, I introduce my colleague from fisheries, John Jargensen. Gracias, Ashley. Yo te mi parte. También quiero tales, en tales la bienvenida al webinar, re-resolviendos con tanto las veces del bosque. Primero quisiera repetir los siguiendos dos puntos técnicos en español. El programa será traducido simultáneamente en español y en vez de escoger su idioma preferido, por favor presione el icono en forma de un tubo pequeño ubicado en la parte inferior derecha de la pantalla. En un entorno virtual, la calidad del audio puede fallar inesperadamente hasta el punto que se vuelve inequada para fines de interpretación. Si eso sucede, los interpretadores indicarán el problema verbalmente y en lugar a la interpretación cuando la calidad del audio lo permita. De nuevo, al gran número de participantes, nos vamos a tener una sesión de preguntas y respuestas. En cambio, elentamos a todos que hagan sus comentarios y preguntas en el chat. Nuestros panelistas harán todo lo posible para responder a las preguntas en el chat después de cada presentación. Esperemos una discusión animada. Igual, como mi colega, está muy emocionado por el gran número de participantes. 360 personas de 58 países registradas y de diferentes sectores y disciplinas, incluyendo la NGL, academia, sector privado y guiamos. Esto demuestra la relevancia del tema y la necesidad de reflexionar sobre la manera en la que estamos trabajando, sobre todo colaborando en nuestra lucha por una gestión sostenible de los recursos naturales y el logro de los ODSes. A continuación, tengo el gusto de introducir Manuel Balaje, director de la División de Pesca, en Vau, quien va a ofrecerlos sus palabras de apertura. Manuel. Gracias, John and Ashley. Buenos días. Buenas tardes. Es un placer darles la bienvenida a todos. I will proceed in English for my introductory remarks. Good morning and good afternoon and good evening everyone. It is a great pleasure for me to welcome you to this event on Resilient Rivers, Counting Fish from the Forest. I would like to start by thanking the panellists for sharing their insights regarding freshwater ecosystem, their fisheries and forests. We hope that this webinar is just the beginning of a longer multi-disciplinary and multi-sectoral dialogue. In fact, this seminar emerged from a recent funding allocation through FAO's Multidisciplinary Fund to connect some of our work on inland fisheries and on forests. This fund intends to strengthen collaboration across disciplines to increase FAO's effectiveness and to encourage creative measures. Ladies and gentlemen in the audience, I thank you for showing up in such numbers and from around the globe demonstrating the importance of today's topic. What we hope for today is to collectively demonstrate the interconnectedness of forestry and fisheries issues in their common freshwater environments and interconnectedness that will provide unique opportunities for innovative collaborations. Let me talk briefly on inland water ecosystems. Inland waters cover just 1% of the earth's surface, but about 50% of all fish species make use of them. These habitats are extremely varied, including streams, rivers, flat plains, lakes, ponds, deltas and more. Set within broader landscapes, the exert major influences. These aquatic ecosystems are highly dynamic and very productive. For example, at least 12 million tonnes or 13% of the world's fish catchers come from inland fisheries. Almost half of it comes from 50 low income food deficit countries and well over a million tonnes come from landlocked countries. In these nations inland fisheries deliver much needed animal protein, nutrients, minerals and vitamins. Inland fisheries are typically part of a mixed livelihood strategy. As such they provide livelihood opportunities for people relying on access to common property resources, providing food for billions and livelihoods for millions of people. Inland fisheries are often the most vulnerable and food insecure people. Forests and aquatic ecosystems in catchment areas are inextricably linked and dynamically interactive with many inland fisheries relying on freshwater habitats that are maintained and supported by forests. Flat plain forest among the world's most endangered forest types support natural river meanders and particularly diverse and productive fisheries. Headwater forests and forested catchments provide soil stability, decrease destructive overland flows during rainstorms, support groundwater recharge and reduce the risk of landslides into downstream rivers and habitats. Repairing forest provides shade, erosion protection, chemical buffering and nutritious terrestrial inputs to aquatic food webs. Flooded forest often support essential inland fisheries. To give a couple of more direct examples, the flooded forest around Cambodia's Great Lake, which the minister will speak about in a few minutes, give rise to one of the largest inland fisheries in the world. Fisher mobile organisms that move up and down river channels and in and out of flat plains and flooded forest where they feed on insects, fruits and seeds and find refuge. In another example, it has been estimated that 75% of commercial fish species in the Amazon are part of food webs that originate in the flooded forests. This fish could in fact be considered a non-wood forest product. But inland and freshwater systems are very much under threat. The Sustainable Development Goal 15.1 calls specifically to ensure the conservation, restoration and sustainable use of terrestrial and inland freshwater ecosystems and their services. Thus further linking forests and inland fisheries. But while they contribute to many other SDGs, freshwater ecosystems are vulnerable and still insufficiently valued. They are subject to high rates of loss and degradation. Globally, wetlands are vanishing three times faster than forests and freshwater vertebrate populations have declined more than twice as steeply as terrestrial populations and even more steeply compared to marine populations. The past 30 years have seen a 50% decrease in populations of freshwater species. Threats and pressures arise chiefly from outside the fishery sector and include land use changes and degradation, deforestation and sustainable agriculture, pollution and poorly managed water users. Experiences shown that restoring land and hydrologies can deliver significant and immediate gains in local fisheries as well as deliver co-benefits such as biodiversity conservation, productive and resilient agriculture, forest and water resources. Let's hope that this event will highlight win-win solutions regarding collective conservation and sustainable use of freshwater ecosystems and forest and guide us further in our work. And with that, I would like to follow the event by introducing his Excellency Ben Sarkon, Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries of Cambodia, who is joining us on a video link. With one of the largest inland fisheries in the world, the linkages between forests and fisheries management are perhaps more clearly shown in Cambodia than in any other country. More importantly, the Cambodian government is a leader in having acknowledged this interrelationship and in having demonstrated his commitment to ensuring environmental sustainability for the benefit of its population. Thank you very much for your attention. Technical colleagues, over to you and to the video. Don Dritter, Mette Wilkie, Mr. Dritter, Manuel Barangy, panelist, fishery and forestry expert, lady and gentlemen. Fishery and forestry are the main natural resources for the livelihood of Cambodian people and the national economy in Cambodia. Cambodia inland fishery, one of the largest and most significant in the world, consists of more than 500 of species. The richness of fish since thousands of the year and is to memorize on the wall of the ancient Angkor Wat temple. Until recently, up to 700,000 tons of fish were caught every year. In addition to 60,000 tons of other activities are any more such as shrimp, crab, snail, frog, insects, snakes, and turtle. Cambodia is also rich in terrestrial biodiversity, including the third largest lowland dry evergreen forest in Southeast Asia with 2,300 plant species and 14 endangered animals. In fact, almost half of Cambodia is forested with nearly 8 million hectares of naturally generating forests. Across the nation, forests provide benefits to freshwater systems. Forests high up in the mountains, protect soil and forest store water in the rainy season that become essential dry season flow. Forests that line stream lakes and river provide shade protection from erosion. Cambodia is also home to 500,000 hectares of flooded forests and over 50,000 hectares of mangrove forests. Forests that are even more closely tied to fisheries which is habitat and source of natural food for fish. Forests and fisheries are the foundation of livelihood and our economy, nearly 4 million people or more than 30% of the population live with the 5 km of the forest with forest resources accounting for an average of 10 to 20% of household consumption sources. Cambodian forests also produce that when harvested sustainably and support the economy provide livelihood and rural area and even store carbon and mitigate climate change. Millions of Cambodian find employment in fishery related activity. Fish and rice remain the nation's staple food. Fish and other aquatics animal are crucial for nutrition and food security because they provide Cambodian people with 80% of their animal protein and much of their essential food and mineral, particularly calcium and vitamin A and fish oil. In land fishery are also of the fundamental important to economy as they contribute 60% to the country GDP. Excellency, ladies and gentlemen, I understand the close relationship between fish, forest and livelihood are crucial important and cannot be guaranteed by the fishery or forestry administration alone. It requires collective effort and collaboration from all sector in both management. The forest is essential for productive fishery that can meet the needs of the Cambodian people. Sustainable management of fishery also has benefit for forest and forest dependent people. The government has taken many action to support forest and fishery. In 1997, the Cambodian government established the Tunlisa biosphere reserve that cover 1.5 million hectares and which is devoted to the long-term protection and conservation of natural resources and the ecosystem and specifically to preserve flooded forest with wildlife hydrological system and natural beauty. In several areas around the Great Lakes we are restoring access for the fish to flooded area including the flooded forest with great benefit for the local people. The government is also implementing policy and law that allow villagers more rights and responsibility to protect and manage natural resources. Ensuring stakeholder participation at the community level. We really need to have a holistic and multidisciplinary approach to watershed management, protection and restoration of ecosystem for the benefit of people and nature. As I said in the beginning natural resources are central to the lives of the Cambodians. Our time we have gained a lot of experience about their sustainable management and many of these lessons have been learned together with the partner such as the FAO and we are happy to share this experience with all of you. I wish to conclude my thinking thanking the organizer for inviting me to address you and this important meeting and all of you for attention. Thank you. Thank you very much for these inspiring words and also policies. Thank you for your leadership and for your contributions to our events. It's my pleasure to introduce the next speaker with four decades of experience supporting private sector restoration of forests for fish. Many of you mentioned riparian forestry and restoration as primary activities for achieving the SDGs from Switzerland to Ghana. Now with an example from the Pacific Northwest USA the floor is yours. Thank you, Ashley. I was asked today to provide a presentation on the process that has evolved in the Pacific Northwest over the last 40 years to better coordinate forest management in the region. Both forestry and fisheries prior to 1950 were the primary drivers of the economy in the Pacific Northwest and they both remain major industries in the region. However, historic forest management as I'll show you in a few minutes severely damaged both freshwater habitats and to some extent estuarine habitats in the region but over the last 40 years and unfortunately I've been around for most of this there have been a series of improvements in the practices, forestry practices around freshwater habitats that have had a really beneficial effect on the quality of our environment in the region. The area that I'm talking about today is circled here in red. It's that blue-green strip along the coastline east Alaska all the way down into northern California. This is an area that has both incredibly productive forests as well as some of the most productive fisheries in the world, most valuable fisheries in the world. Taking a look at the forest, this is a chart that represents relative forest production across the globe and in this case the growth of eucalyptus plantations in New Zealand and South America is arbitrarily set at 100. You can see that the only forests in the northern hemisphere that actually approach the kind of productivity you see in southern hemisphere eucalyptus forests are the softwood forests in the US Pacific Northwest so it's an incredibly productive environment for forests. I'm going to give you some indication of the kinds of economic activity associated with forestry and here I will just use as an example some figures from one particular jurisdiction in the Pacific Northwest state of Washington. In Washington as of 2011 when this information was generated there were 1,700 forest businesses in the state employing 42,000 workers for $1 billion annually in wages. Total economic activity associated with forestry in Washington state is about 28 billion US dollars per year and you can multiply that figure by about six times to cover the entire Pacific Northwest region so forestry still remains a very, very big economic driver in the region. Fisheries is also important although because of fish stocks it's not nearly as economically active as it was historically particularly south of the Canadian border but still it is a fairly important source of both income and jobs. 16,500 fisheries jobs in Washington state and it generates about $500 million US dollars per year in economic activity. Of those fish one is a particular significance when we talk about this nexus between forest management and fisheries and that is salmon. There are a number of salmon species in the Pacific Northwest historically they were a critically important component of the fisheries however they are greatly depressed so the amount that are caught each year is quite a bit lower than it was historically but even more important than the economic and fisheries fish is their cultural importance particularly Canadian cultures in the Pacific Northwest but these truly are a revered fish in the region. To give you some idea about their status now south of the Canadian border over the last 20 years 27 populations have been given protection under the US Endangered Species Act because of the high probability of expectation so they really have been severely affected by a variety of factors forestry being one of these. So let's take a look at how historic forest practices impacted aquatic habitats. Prior to about 1970 forestry was conducted in a way that was not particularly protected of aquatic environments. All the trees within a broad area were cut those trees were then yarded up to a landing using typically cable systems and some of the logs that they collected were quite large grow some very large trees here in the Pacific Northwest but the result was this figure shown in the upper right and this is a picture that was taken in the mid 1960s so it's not battle depending on your context what the landscape looked like. All the trees are gone after the trees were harvested the area was burned to facilitate replanting with young trees but there was no protection afforded for the stream flowing down there through the valley in the picture this is a salmon bearing stream obviously these were a set of practices that had really consequential effects on aquatic ecosystems. One practice that was very dramatic and the results of this particular practice are still evident today throughout the Northwest and that is the process that was used until the 1950s to transport logs from the forest down to the sawmill where they were processed and this was called log drive essentially trees were cut they were then cut into logs approximately 15 meters in length and all of these logs were placed in a stream channel or a small river channel then a structure upstream called a splash dam was opened releasing a rush of water then moved downstream to where the logs had been placed in the stream channel where those logs were floated and then log drivers or log rollers riding on top of these floating logs coming down the stream would herd these things downstream until they got to the sawmill this was a practice that had massive impacts on the aquatic ecosystems throughout the Pacific Northwest there was direct mortality of organisms living in the stream at the time one of these drives occurred banks were eroded the perian vegetation was removed and the effects of this practice are still quite evident throughout most of the drainage networks in the Pacific Northwest today so we are still attempting to recover from this particular type of management even though it stopped over 70 years ago so about 1960s 1970s people began to recognize that forestry was playing a role in pressing fish stocks throughout the region and at that time we began the long process sometimes painful process contentious process of developing management prescriptions management measures that would ensure the protection of aquatic habitats and allow the recovery in very important fish populations and the entire process really was based on one fairly simple principle and that was the belief that if we could very specifically identify those portions of the landscape that had the greatest degree of interaction with aquatic ecosystems we could focus our protected measures at these sites and by doing that both enable a high degree of protection for aquatic habitats and at the same time allowing a forest land owner to manage most of this property for the continued production of water so what are these important areas well really in the Pacific Northwest we've focused on four primary issues related to forest management and its effects on aquatic systems the first is the protection of repairing areas including flood points the second are forest roads once log drives were done the logs were taken from the forest to mill by trucks obviously they required roads roads both generate considerable amounts of sediment and they also create in many cases barriers to the upstream passage of fish the Pacific Northwest also is quite steep and we get quite a lot of rainfall as a result landslides are an issue and forest practices both road construction and logging can increase the frequency of landslides the final issue that was addressed during the evolution of these forest management prescriptions was forest chemicals and I'm not going to talk much about the chemical part of this today really the chemical concerns focused on potential impacts on human health so it clearly is a critical concern but it's been less of an issue when talking about aquatic ecosystems during the 1970s people first began to talk about affording some protection for repairing systems in unmanaged forest landscapes and the concern at that time was primarily with water temperature the thought being that removing the trees from the screen edge removed shade, allowed sunlight to hit the water increasing water temperature which is bad for salmon which are cold water fish so in the mid 1970s the first set of riparian prescriptions in the pacific northwest was developed however these were not particularly stringid measures and as a matter of fact they were not really they didn't really result in any consistent buffering of the streams there were a couple loopholes one was that no streams above 700 meters in elevation that was in Washington state required buffers the thought being that streams at higher elevation were naturally cold and didn't need the shade the second loophole was that people didn't landowners did not have to retain trees at sites where they trees might get blown over the pacific northwest during the wintertime gets frequent large storms that come in off of the pacific ocean and you can make the case that trees anywhere could blow down so as a result very few buffers were left during the 1970s it wasn't until the 1980s that we got a set of rules and regulations that required the consistent protection of forested buffers along streams and this occurred as partly as a result of the increased appreciation for the important role that riparian zones play not only in protecting water temperature but also for some other functions including input of large wood industry channels which is an important structural component stream systems create pools, regulates material movement in the stream here's a figure that shows a large number of salmon utilizing a pool formed by a piece of large wood and also litter input input of leaves and needles which is an important energy source that supports the food webs in stream and river systems so as a result of what happened in the 80s buffers were finally required consistently on all aquatic habitats this buffering system was further enhanced in the 1990s into the early 2000s and the changes included the protection of floodplains no forest management whatsoever on floodplains recognizing the important role they play in maintaining productive fisheries and also buffering was extended upstream beyond the areas that were actually occupied by fish the concern here being that these small streams although they didn't directly support fish impacts on those small streams ultimately to be transported downstream to fish bearing reaches and as a result impact the productivity of those systems so now in the Pacific Northwest I think we have relatively good buffering prescriptions that are applied pretty consistently throughout the entire region in Washington our buffers average about 60 meters on either side of the stream with some light management out at the outer edge of those buffers and we completely protect floodplains let's talk a little bit now about about roads second big issue roads have two major problems one is that they can generate sediment and they generate sediment in two ways one is the crushing of the road surface by traffic and then subsequently the washing of that road surface during rainstorms that sediment moves in the roadside ditches directly prior to the 1990s those roadside ditches were drained directly into streams and rivers the other way that roads affect sediment delivery is through improper road location which leads to landslides landslides move massive amounts of sediment downstream and nine times that a landslide winds up in a stream channel the other impact that roads have is that where a stream passes a road in many cases the message block occurs so what we've done over time here in the Pacific Northwest is implement a series of measures that are designed to reduce the production of sediment from road surfaces these include things like requirements to use farmed surfacing materials that breaks down more slowly under traffic but most significantly the one management prescription that's had the greatest effect is the deliberate disconnection of the road drainage network the roadside ditches from natural drainage networks in watersheds ditch water is now drained off onto the forest floor that's sufficient distance from a natural drainage channel so that that water can soak into the soil leaving the sediment behind and this has been really a very effective mechanism for reducing sediment delivery to streams passage blockages were a huge problem on forest roads prior to about 2000 since that time forest landowners have committed in the Northwest to fixing these issues and that requires the installation of a crossing structure that has a natural stream bed in the bottom not a pipe because you have to provide passage both for the adult fish quite athletic and capable of making it through some barriers that in some cases are hard to believe but also for the juvenile fish that are rearing in these systems for most of the time during the year and they cannot get through anything that's particularly difficult so this is an example of one such culvert replacement went from this round pipe with a large fall at the downstream end to this arch pipe which has natural stream in the middle of the day finally landslides landslides were a huge problem in the Pacific Northwest any kind of management activity road construction forest harvest on an unstable field slope feature frequently leads to a landslide starting in the 1990s we began to develop processes in the Pacific Northwest to help us identify any kind of management activity on those unstable sites this process involves in the office exercise looking at available data sources maps, lighter coverage if you have it and then using that process to identify sites on the ground that appear may have stability issues subsequently on the ground visit to the site and then ultimately the development of a map that indicates where trees can be harvested harvested and where trees cannot be harvested this particular example the red lines represents the outline of the area that's logged the green line is the area set aside for repairing buffers and then these orange polygons represent areas where the forest harvest is allowed in those locations so over time in the Pacific Northwest we have developed a pretty comprehensive set of management prescriptions for the protection of aquatic habitats and this has had beneficial effects but the mechanism that we've used over the last 40 years primarily for implementing these new management procedures has been regulatory it's been mandatory regulations but in the last 20 years there have been a number of new tools that have been added to the toolbox that can help us encourage more sustainable forest management one of these is the process of forest certification which is essentially a market based system to encourage sustainable forest management in this kind of a system customers commit to purchasing wood products and wood only from producers who can demonstrate that they are generating that material sustainably in a way that a landowner would do this by getting certified through the existing forest certification systems globally one of the big ones is FSC the forest stewardship council in Canada in the US and North American sustainable forestry initiative one that is very commonly used but the idea here is that these certification systems contain standards if a landowner commits to meeting these standards undergoes an audit it then gets certified you can put that certification seal on its products and as a result it increases its access to the market this has been a very effective tool at generating more sustainable forest management worldwide the other opportunity we have going forward is beginning to develop systems for monetizing ecosystem goods and services beyond simply wood and that includes some things that have already developed there is some opportunity to get for a landowner to get compensation for carbon sequestration in the US the environmental protection agency runs a program called wetland mitigation banking where landowners get compensated for maintaining wetlands in high quality conditions it's also biomass energy and some of the sustainability requirements associated with that and conservation easements in the US have been used broadly to encourage more sustainable forest management so I think that we have done a relatively good job in the Pacific Northwest over the last 40 years of developing a system that protects aquatic ecosystems there are some opportunities to do things a little bit better in the future however I do think that there is a takeaway message from the Pacific Northwest that can be broadly applied to other forest regions in the world and that is if you in fact can identify these areas that are particularly important for maintaining the health of aquatic ecosystems and focus protective measures at those sites I think it is possible to have both healthy productive fisheries and still maintain a viable economically viable forest products industry so thank you very much Thank you very much Thank you very much Thank you very much Thank you very much Thank you for sharing your experience with us that was extremely interesting we're going to go south to Colombia with Mr Mauricio Valderrama director of the Fundación Umedales he has carried out research in fisheries resources and has carried out environmental and fisheries management activities for sustainable use in wetlands in Magdalena the Amazon river and other areas he's going to tell us about how to strengthen the local governance of fisheries and how to carry out activities to achieve integral sustainability in the basin of the Magdalena river in Colombia you have the floor sir good morning good morning good morning I thank FAO for the invitation what I am going to show you in a few minutes is a process that we have carried out in Colombia in order to strengthen fisheries governance as well as some activities that contributes within an integral framework that contributes to the sustainability of the Magdalena river basin this is a process that started more than six years ago initially with two fisherman associations then three now therefore we provide support and accompaniment from the beginning with the national fisheries authority which is known as Aounap in Colombia let us begin to look at the Magdalena river basin it is in the northern part of South America in the center of the country we have the Magdalena river basin it is the sources in the Andes and it ends up in the Caribbean and it goes through the Andean valleys the Magdalena river 1,538 km it has more than 3 million hectares associated with aquatic ecosystems it is also the basin that receives a lot of pressure in the country it is the main basin of the country more than 40 million inhabitants 78% of the population and we produce 80% of the GDP electricity and coffee production as well and thermal electricity as well as agricultural production so original ecosystems have suffered from this pressure and obviously fisheries resources have also been affected in the red circle you see the Magdalena river it is the most important fisheries area of the basin let's look at the fish in the Magdalena river basin we have 233 species 68% of them are endemic with biodiversity that is one of the country's patrimony 91 are the object of fishing 65 are for human consumption trade and 40 are simply ornamental and then 8 species have been introduced that have been brought to the area by accident it wasn't planned amongst all of those species we have the barred sorry boom that has the highest represents the highest threat and it is considered as a morose species in the last 40 years we see in this graph how the fisheries production in the Magdalena basin has had a 64% reduction more than half of the fisheries production has disappeared in the last 40 years we also see that the second species of production it has the greatest commercial value and we have considered the annual production in 16.8 million dollars that is back in 2017 so the basin is very important with a lot of it is subjected to a lot of pressure and we need to carry out management and conservation activities for the governance of all of our fisheries who are our fishermen we have 32,000 fishermen that live around the area 157,000 people are the direct beneficiaries from this source of employment the rural population is rather poor with less than the monthly minimum legal wages they have very little there is very little generational shift they have bad living conditions they have now understood what the role can be in terms of organization and conservation we also have a complex environment within an area that is subject to many pressures the forest cover has been reducing steadily in the last 50 years the population has been increasing catchment areas have been growing the production of gold has been growing and that entails a lot of problems for the environment a lot of contamination we have the loss of connectivity we have a complex environmental situation and right now 90% of our fisheries production in a research we have just completed is explained by environmental variables overfishing is no longer the main cause of the reduction of our fisheries resources so the problem is in the integral management of the area we need to understand the environment the forests the rivers and the catchment areas this is the landscape of Karate Chukuri that is where we began and now we have other associations in Barranco de Mera this is the area of the Magdalena river we started here 57 kilometers of river 300 fishermen and four fisherman's associations have joined the process so we see the culture that is associated with the fishing activities the canoes the ports and this is the reality of our landscape we started the process with all the fishermen with conservation strategies based on local knowledge trying to achieve the management of the territory and we have the classical management of the fisheries resources we ask the questions such as can we go beyond the classical management of fisheries with unofficial norms do these contribute to the conservation of the species how can we make the local system more resilient with the support of other fisheries organizations we started carrying out social analysis workshops with a participative process with our fishermen who are obtaining and producing information on the effort the size of our fish the seasons community management to reach agreements, management agreements we have created a local committee for fisheries management that is where we meet and discuss and twice a year we have consultation processes with planning and the interinstitutional structure both in the local community and regional levels that is what we started doing in 2014 with fisheries agreements we have some norms that are unofficial but that can be observed we reached an agreement to protect the breeding season we have had changes in the flows and flow rates of the river so we need to have the seasonal closure exactly when the breeding is taking place here you see the size of landings of catch the allowable catches we speak in terms of pounds of fish we also have rules for our fishing gear agreements depending on the seasons and so forth we have reservoir areas to define a conservation strategy for sorobims we have four reserved areas to our special management and one is in an area where it is completely forbidden to fish in swamps roughly 1300 hectares have been protected and what was important was that the fishing authority authorised these agreements endorsed them producing an administrative certificate that adopted the recommendations amongst the fishermen as we had done with the seasonal closure to allow breeding and reproduction and the fishermen themselves are carrying out the follow-up and monitoring they themselves collect the information process it and distribute it with our support but they are becoming more independent in producing their own information then we have the monitoring of the reserved areas we carry out educational activities assessment activities and we also define some levels of adherence to the agreement here you can see the months the years each figure the size the gear the level of compliance the important thing is that in time we have improved our compliance rate in the six years we have constantly improved we carry out evaluations and assessments every month and discuss it all in our meetings at the table what we do is present and analyze the results of the processes we propose management measures we try to improve the trust between institutions and the community and we try to bring the state closer to the community we have two meetings a year with all the stakeholders and entities involved the national associations that deal with fisheries and other sectors as well and we try to have the participation of all the local stakeholders in the the table now we have helped them understand that it is necessary to carry out conservation activities to protect the territory we carry out educational activities with children in all of our schools we have developed educational projects in all of the schools and the fishermen themselves are the teachers they themselves show their children the importance of the fisheries we have connectivity restoration activities for our flood lands the lack of connectivity is one of our more serious problems and then we have rehabilitation for forests in our floodable plains the relationship of the forests with the fish, with productivity services that water ecosystems provide we carry out rehabilitation activities we have a small plant production structure as you can see we have freshwater projects so that people may access clean fresh water and we have projects with protection measures of the quality of water and in Bocas de Carare we also have these all of these activities for the purification of water are within an integral holistic protection of the territory and of the resources and of the resources in other ways what are our reflections we began six years ago and we have now a social, environmental and economic transformation process in the implied locations it is sad to say we rarely have access to communication systems the best practices in fishing agreements are complied with in a reasonable manner as we showed and this is a clear contribution to the conservation of the barred sorobim it's a small area but it can act as a pilot to replicate the quality of life in the basin of the river we have already started the process in other regions continuity for more than five years of the Mesa del Bagre of our meetings has managed to create a regional planning and coordination tool the sector has become more resilient and the implementation of the quality of life and the reduction of poverty have strengthened our process we are now working on consolidating the financial independence of associations to ensure the sustainability of the process so that they may feel they own the process themselves and so that they may fund it in the future as well as their own associations so these are the institutions that have supported us that have helped us out and I would like to thank the Fishing Authority that has always supported us they have always been with us from the start and all of these entities have supported us and continue giving us their support so I hope I have been able to illustrate the strengthening of governance and complementary activities process that we are carrying out in the Magdalena River Basin in Colombia and I hope you have found it interesting thank you so much for your kind attention thank you very much Mr. Valdurama it's been my pleasure to learn about your work before this webinar and now to hear about it in more detail is really a great opportunity thank you for this excellent presentation so again referring to our pre-webinar survey of participant opinions you ranked various types of activities in terms of their priority for achieving the STGs particular target 15.1 and the highest ranked activities were development of inter or multidisciplinary management frameworks capacity building and watershed planning including forestry, fisheries, and water management and importantly implementation of cross-sectoral river basin management plans so with over 25 years of experience in intersexual river basin management planning I would like to introduce Mr. Evans Kaseke he's worked for the World Bank for UNESCO and the African Development Bank and he is currently the program manager for the Zambezi River Strategic Plan Mr. Kaseke, the floor is yours and I will begin to share the presentation please let me know when you want me to change slides all right we can get going thank you I think to to maximize on my bandwidth over here I'll just switch off the video for the moment but just to show who I am this is Evans Kaseke from the Zambezi Watercourse Commission and as I've already been introduced I'm responsible for strategic planning development of instruments of cooperation in the Zambezi Watercourse thank you so I'll switch off my video and focus on the presentation what I'm going to be doing today is to share with you framework the large framework that we have developed in the Zambezi for cooperative management of this particular natural resource before I can embark on the presentation I would like to inform the meeting that the Zambezi has been designated a fishery a significant fishery in southern Africa and has been done through activities that we've embarked on with the African Union I think some of you know which is actually fronting the development of fisheries in Africa the southern African development community the fisheries division we are actually at the Zambezi Commission we are actually part of the technical development of the African Union on fisheries the SDAC committee on fisheries so there's quite a lot of work that we have been doing together with these two key organizations the continental as well as the regional on the development of fisheries in southern Africa and my presentation is going to be on multi-sectoral management of large rivers and in this case the Zambezi watercourse let's go on to the second next slide please the outline of my presentation amounts to the key items that I will be focusing on Zambezi watercourse key features Zambezi watercourse the definition this is very important so that everybody is at par with the kind of feature that we are actually talking about the governance structure this is very critical for cooperative management of these large features these transboundary features then I will also move on to the key challenges the ones that actually galvanize that actually galvanized the eight countries in the Zambezi watercourse to get together and produce and come up with the Zambezi watercourse commission then also I will move on to the opportunities for enhanced cooperation amounts to the eight countries I will touch on the vision which is the preferred development future then I will move on to the key instrument of cooperation the main framework within which the Zambezi is now being managed and within which fisheries the issue of fisheries is actually going to be managed then I will end up with the foreseen benefits of cooperation next slide please the Zambezi watercourse key features amongst others are that it is the fourth largest river in Africa after the Nile the Congo and the Niger and just to give you an example when we compare for example the discharge of the Zambezi with respect to the Congo when the Congo when they say you know it's a drought year and there's not much water in the Congo just downstream of Kinshasa we are talking of around 40,000 cubic meters per second that is a very large discharge and then we talk of the Zambezi probably at its mouth we'll be talking around 7,000 cubic meters anything up to 10 15,000 cubic meters per second in a very good season so when you compare it with the Nile, the Niger the Zambezi is somewhere there but not as large then also another key feature of the Zambezi is actually a watercourse which is shared by eight countries that are the republics of Angola Botswana Malawi Mozambique Namibia Tanzania and Zimbabwe and what brings these countries together is an agreement which they actually signed in 2004 which actually called the agreement on the establishment of the Zambezi watercourse commission that's the one which actually the organization that presides over this transboundary system is actually the Zambezi watercourse commission and another key feature the mean annual runoff which is available for development mean annual runoff is around 200 billion cubic meters per second and this water actually this is very important when we are talking about fisheries this is it and when we talk of deforestation it adversely impacts on the availability of this resource for the management for the availability of viable fisheries and then also it's very important to talk about the people within the Zambezi watercourse at the moment we are talking about around 45 million people and the population is projected to be around 50 to 55 million around 2025 so when we talk of the population the people we are actually also focusing on the issue of dependence that population is dependent on the resources that are available within the Zambezi watercourse and you can also imagine the dependence on not only the water but also the issues that will arise and in this case water pollution it adversely impacts on the availability of quality water for fish for breeding as well the environment that they need to thrive in so we are talking of issues that are actually interlinked that are interwoven that can adversely or positively impact on fisheries next slide please next slide yes before I can go on before I can go on it's very important that we get to know what Zambezi is Zambezi is actually defined as a watercourse that definition is actually is enshrined in the United Nations Convention on non-navigation uses of water that's where it originates from then that was cascaded down to the southern African revised protocol on shared water courses water courses are what we have in southern Africa we don't have really river basins because with river basins you are actually focusing on the liquids that you actually find within those drainage basins but with the watercourse the definition is the system of surface and ground waters of the Zambezi constituting by virtue of their physical relationship a unitary hole flowing normally into a common terminus and in this case the Indian ocean the Zambezi watercourse is perceived broadly to also include the topography of the landscape and associated lands of the Zambezi river so we are talking of the Zambezi river in association with all the lands that are actually in its catchment let's go on to the next next yes and after the future we also have to take note of the situation that for the watercourse commission to operate there is a structure that was actually set up and this is actually enshrined in the agreement which was signed in 2004 and the highest decision making body within the Zambezi watercourse commission is the council of ministers and at the moment we are talking of ministers of water they are the key officials that sit in that body so they decide they actually endorse and approve activities that are actually carried out year in year out within the Zambezi watercourse and just below the technical the council of ministers there is the technical committee these are primarily permanent secretaries and directors from the ministries of water but these two organs the council of ministers it has demanded to actually share what is occurring within the Zambezi watercourse with other ministers from other sectors as well as you know informing the heads of states the presidents the prime ministers on activities that are actually going on within the Zambezi watercourse and it is through these two key organizations that you know the issue of ownership is anchored within the Zambezi watercourse then the secretariat where I sit this is actually where we have got demanded to actually operationalize to implement decisions of council and below the secretariat there are specialized working groups for example if now we are going to be embarking on the development of a framework for cooperative management of fisheries in the Zambezi watercourse that entails that you know we have to actually put together a specialist group of experts who are very specialized in fisheries so they are the ones who actually sit in that particular group and advise and drive the process of developing a framework a regional framework for the development and management of fisheries also what I wish to share with the meeting is that the Zambezi watercourse commission its activities are actually anchored in a very strong watercourse multi-sector multi-sectoral stakeholder activity so the multi-sector component plays a major major role in the development of all sectors sectoral activities within the Zambezi watercourse so this is primarily what happens is what comes out of the multi-sectoral stakeholder level which is right at the bottom there which is the foundation that's what actually is pushed right up to the council of ministers so the council of ministers are actually mandated to actually deal with what comes what is recommended from the lower levels and those lower levels include we're talking of the public sector we're talking of the private sector we're talking of the NGOs we're talking of our rural people the ordinary person who is the key beneficiary of the activities of the commission is actually the one who will sit in that particular organ right at the bottom let's go on to the next slide the key challenges that were identified that were identified you know throughout the Zambezi watercourse commission were actually identified through a very intense stakeholder consultative process this actually started around 2004 soon after the signing of the agreement and there was a strategy and integrated water resources management strategy for the Zambezi which was produced in 2008 that is a key document whereby stakeholders multi sectoral stakeholders articulated these particular challenges you know for the Zambezi we know that when it comes to challenges we can have specifics like water pollution we can have environmental degradation climate change all those are challenges but what are the key overarching challenges these are the key challenges that were actually articulated by stakeholders and these actually touch on all the other all the other challenges we can think of climate change, environmental degradation and in this case the first one was articulated as persistent poverty there is the need for equitable and resilient development these are the broad statements that were actually articulated crystallized you know from the multi sectoral stakeholder consultations the next one it was articulated that there is competition there are competing uses for water in this case talking of hydropower agriculture urban industrial and of importance there is need for balanced development then also another key challenge infrastructure deficits this is very key when we talk of development we are talking of infrastructure it's not just water but there is if I could it's actually anchored within a multi sectoral spectrum so here when we talk of infrastructure deficit we are talking of energy we are talking of transport roads we are talking of green energy we are talking of the grey infrastructure one of the key key desires of the stakeholders there is need for infrastructure development also environmental degradation this is another key challenge that was actually that was identified by the stakeholders environmental degradation we are talking of pollution also of pollution deforestation and that there is need for sustainable development as well and here we are talking of environmental resources development and protection then also another key challenge which is always experienced within the watercourse disaster risk was a key challenge that was identified and here for the stakeholders the need for climate resilient development so issues of climate change they come in very strongly so let's go on to the next next slide please the key opportunities for sustainable development in this underwater course were also identified by multi sectoral stakeholders consultations as pent up socio-economic development demand in the region there is demand for socio-economic development in the region be it agriculture in energy, in transport and manufacturing by one would find that like at the southern African community development level industrialization has been prioritized because there is need for that in respect also to uplifting the standards of living of the populations then also demonstrable political will to co-operate this is a key feature that actually is driving the processes in this underwater course a very good example the political will to co-operate we are talking of the signing of the 2004 agreement after years of negotiation and as of 2019 we have witnessed actually the adoption of a new framework of operation and planning for the Zambez Watercourse and this is the strategic plan for the Zambez Watercourse then also we are talking of legal and institutional frameworks that have been agreed on as instruments of cooperation examples the agreement divides the protocol on shared water courses the strategic plan all those they constitute the legal framework and what for these to come into being the political willingness to co-operate is a key feature and also what I want to share with the meeting is these legal and institutional frameworks they come about through a very strong sectoral stakeholder consultative process these products of those processes then we are also talking of strong and extensive analytical foundations in the Zambez we have got lots of studies that are actually going on generation of information and data that is actually going to be that is very useful for informing decision making as we are just talking I can give you a very good example we have just been granted a multi-million dollar grant by the European Union to actually embark on serious studies those studies they will generate information and data they will also be generating experts at the masters and doctorate levels in the various sectoral fields that are of importance for the Zambez water course so this is actually an bonus a plus for the Zambez water course then also through another world bank study called the Monsieur multi-sector investment opportunity analysis study there was an identification that there is actually opportunities for investments in infrastructure with more than 16 billion and some of it we have just recently witnessed the commissioning of a bridge 360 million bridge on the Zambez that is from Botswana to Zambia but all the other countries are also involved that is what we are talking about the potential for cooperative investments in poverty alleviating infrastructure this is important we have got a program called creative climate resilient infrastructure development facility which is actually funded by the UK government to the tune of 1 million pounds that is actually going to be it has been operating investing in infrastructure that is actually targeting a poverty alleviation infrastructure and that infrastructure I would like to also share with you that there is also a component of fisheries in irrigation systems we have got those night storage dams in those night storage dams and there is the opportunity for fisheries for aquaculture and we have got examples that we can actually share with colleagues water transfers there are two major water transfers one for Botswana another one for Zimbabwe hydro power production we are talking of the Batoka gorge for which now the EIA is being concluded then also transplanted irrigation schemes they are all on the cards so these are key opportunities for sustainable development within the water course let's go on to the next slide please what also binds the people within the Zimbabwe water course they actually during the development of the of the strategic plan they agreed on a vision with respect to where they want to be taken to by development the preferred future it reads as maximise the economic benefits of water development in the Zimbabwe water course they have predicted constraints of ensuring the maintenance of moderate environmental flows and flood protection so this is the development future that was preferred and which is now the vision of development for all the people in the Zimbabwe water course let's move on to the next slide please next slide please yes let's go on to the strategic plan for the Zimbabwe water course as a main instrument of cooperation for all the eight countries in the Zimbabwe water course and this is now the new framework of planning and operations for the Zimbabwe water course and it's the one that is actually going to be driving development through which development is going to be driven for the Zimbabwe water course and in the agreement of 2004 the development of the strategic plan was actually made a priority and it was defined as a development plan comprising a general planning tool the general planning tool we've got a decision support system that we actually developed which is in place and which was developed through a multi-sectoral consultative process which was agreed on as the tool that will be used for the Zimbabwe in planning by all the eight countries and there is also an inherent process for the identification categorization and prioritization of projects and programs for the efficient management and sustainable development of the Zimbabwe water course and inherent to this process of identification categorization and prioritization there is what we call, there's another instrument of cooperation which is entitled the ZAMCOM procedures for notification of planned measures and what this does is that if a country wants to develop a project in any of its territory it has to notify other countries so that you know there's no harm which is okay to other countries by way of developing that particular asset and in this case we can also let it to fisheries with fish they like water of a certain quality water of a certain quantity for them to thrive you know to breed so all of those have got to be maintained and this strategic plan contributes to the contributes to the mission of ZAMCOM which is to promote the equitable and reasonable utilization of water resources of the ZANBEZ water cost as well as sustainable development thereof. Next slide please this is just strategic plan the objective what I would just say is it provides a basis for an agreed coordinated and integrated implementation of activities in the context of efficient management and sustainable and what I can also with respect to share with you on the last statement is that having adopted the strategic plan member states are now required to conduct their management and development plans projects and programs relating to the ZANBEZ water cost in accordance with the strategic plan next slide please the core components of the strategic plan are infrastructure investment livelihood support environmental protection and water resources management those are the key pillars of the strategic plan so all the investments are going to be coming through those particular pillars next slide please yes and you may also want to know that you know the preparation of the strategic plan which is now the main planning and operations framework is based on the previous on the studies quite a lot of studies that have gone on you know in the ZANBEZ and then also the second bullet it talks to the strong multi-sector stakeholder consultation process that actually goes on for all the activities in the ZANBEZ water cost next slide please so for the strategic plan to be implemented what happened was the strategic plan was deliberately developed without an implementation plan so a number of activities had to be done before the actual implementation of the strategic plan so a number of activities have been prioritized under each of those pillars the one that I would like to mention that I would like to share with you is one that we are actually implementing right away in cooperation with the WWF and with our assistant from the United States USAID and the United States Department of State and this is actually focusing on dialogues so that you know people you know stakeholders let's say from Angola or Portuguese speaking from Namibia or English speaking Mozambique also Portuguese speaking you know from the whole spectrum from the upstream to the downstream to the mouth of the of the ZANBEZ they should be able to talk to address issues pertaining to transboundary development so there is a program that is actually working on the dialogue how people can actually talk to each other about issues pertaining to the transboundary system which is the ZANBEZ and that's just one that I want to share with you. Next slide please yes for seeing benefits of cooperation the management and development of the ZANBEZ is actually a cooperative activity and these are some of the benefits that were actually articulated by through multi sectoral stakeholder consultations peace dividends increase the food security increase the regional economic benefits increase the energy security joint investment planning jointly addressing external threats increased employment opportunities these are key drivers that make people that make the countries and ultimately the people co-operates and at the bottom you can see there is that bar with the flags of the eight countries and then you've got Danida you've got World Bank and some GIZ what that symbolizes is with the eight countries we need partnership international co-operating partners strategic partner organizations and that is the way we are operating in the ZANBEZ that is essential for multi sectoral management of large rivers and lastly thank you that is a picture of the Victoria Falls very important for tourism thank you thank you very much Mr. Kaseki that was extremely interesting and truly relevant last speaker on my list is Mr. Nelson Alex from the Kichwa peoples and an NGO of Ecuador Mr. Dawa has extensive experience as a researcher and is currently the director of a division of the agriculture of Ecuador represents the stakeholders on the ground he will be addressing the issue of how indigenous peoples draw a link between the environment and human well-being and how this is reflected in their customs and traditions will also be addressing the importance of forests, rivers and fisheries for indigenous peoples as a main topic for his presentation on the floor thank you Ashley, thank you for inviting me to take part in this event I'm part of this broader picture we've painted and I'd like to tell you a little bit about the customs and traditions of indigenous peoples from the I'd like to share with you the experiences of our people it's important to understand how indigenous peoples live which is why I've tried to summarize a few key aspects I'd like to tell you about how we live and why our world view as indigenous peoples includes the importance of forests, rivers fisheries in our daily lives in the province of Pestasa as you can see it's quite a large area a very diverse region of Ecuador with seven different nationalities including Chuar, Chuar Warani Chuar, Chuar Andoan and they're distributed across different areas as you can see in the image up on the screen which is a map of the different nationalities within these many generations have lived their lives and exercised their customs with a view to keeping forests alive in each of their individual territories that's key in order to achieve sustainable development across all nationalities and all peoples as a people and as nationalities we have dwelt in four main aspects one of the elements is called biodiversity you know that biodiversity is included in many aspects or components that are a part of it in our own language in our cosmo vision we have guidelines and it is important that this has prevailed throughout the life of our communities our culture has also been important as each of the communities has developed its own culture for millions of years how they have carried out work in each of their communities and then the element of history is also an important pillar in each of our communities because the history of each of our communities is developed according to how they have transformed and experienced their spirituality with the relationship with forests between forests and mankind and men and women in the communities and another thing is living together shared lives sharing between our brothers peoples communities our experiences our everyday life to have conversations to become familiar to solve problems amongst family members that is why our shared lives together within our nationalities has been so important here you see grandmother Rebeca who has great knowledge of her own culture and she has handed it down by narrating the life of the different nationalities one of the examples of our community can be told through the stories the narrative Tiax are those who have left the higher basin of pastasas to the lower basin towards Maranhon and they have named the rivers because the Tiax have been powerful they take ayahuasca or other medicinal remedies based on their tradition the tradition of their spirituality in terms of naming the rivers so they are like small scientists because they through their vision have seen the development of the rivers where they come from how to name them all of this has been important from pastasas all the way downstream another of the historical issues that are told by our grandparents the amasangas our ancestors they are the kings of the jungle they have the energy they own the forest and they attract the animals of many species in a primary intangible forest where not just anyone can enter not just any human being can carry out his or her activities there and the amasangas are the owners so they have a territory that is reserved only to them and nobody else can enter it because that is where the spiritual conversations with the lord take place and only through them can you carry out work or activities there the huri huris is a similar story millenary story history of the indigenous peoples in the pastasa people and the ingaros also they have been marked spirituality they have maintained for thousands of years in many of the communities transforming it into an experience the spirituality living in the jungle and they keep the jungle alive that is why the relationship with rivers and forests has always been important in the stories that are handed down generation from generation the culture here in pastasa has been varied since we have seven nationalities different peoples and communities have their own customs and traditions and for example we have dances and the dances are different amongst the nationalities painting painting our bodies has different meanings in the different communities as you can see in this image through the blow gun this man is being painted and then they wear ornaments and they know how to preserve the forest in its natural habitat and the different practices of yacac here at grandmother is blowing so that the evil spirits can leave to free this man who was linked to evil spirits and he needs to be liberated from them that is important in each of our nationalities and that is how they have lived and produced many yacacs that have been handed down generation from generation and it has been important to strengthen this in the daily lives of each of these communities and then they also have costumes the ornaments they wear have been important in their daily lives they have different types of clothing that has meaning from the ancestors from the grandparents and ethnobiology has focused on the nationalities as these know many of the species in their own languages that they apply in their daily lives they use them in their daily lives and it has been very important they support many of the communities and the ones that are nearby along the highways where mining activities are carried out have been partially lost because in the area of the highways those who carry out forestry activities have invaded the area and the community needs to survive with its own harmony and they try to maintain their own language but more and more they are starting to speak in Spanish and English and their children and young people are learning English and Spanish and the traditional languages in the high basin of PASTAZA is now being partially lost another important aspect has been sharing our lives and our agricultural activities in the PASTAZA province of the Amazon area as you can see they share they make chicha which is by the women and everyone takes part in the cooking the children the girls the mothers they prepare this and that has been our tradition sharing between families between brothers between communities because that is how certain experiences of ancient knowledge of seed keeping are handed down and communicated each of the communities has ancestral feeds that they have kept for many many centuries and it is important for the territory because the communities they have not devoted themselves to agriculture in a large territorial extension only have a hectare for example of land is what each community cultivated but there is a lot of diversity in the agricultural systems both for the extraction of wood or other crops of plants that are endemic in the area however some communities are beginning to lose this tradition and then there is also a tradition of textiles with mokawa you see that this woman is weaving a mokawa representing many of those textile products represent the animals that are important from the spiritual standpoint and through the preparation of the mokawa they produce also the chicha and that is why it has been important to safeguard this in all the communities you see the child holding a squirrel because we live together with our animals so the child knows and lives together with the fauna that is how our communities live with the animals and that is what has kept our culture alive the ecosystem is alive it is intact human beings have not caused a huge impact on our territory because of this because we live in harmony with nature that is how we share our lives together and also basket weaving the community itself knows how to weave what you see here is a bejuko that is the basket that is made by men in many shapes for different activities as you can see here for agriculture to carry out bananas, pineapples sugar cane and that is important for each of the communities so ancestral knowledge is important because ancestors grandparents handed down the traditions but now we are losing this in part because multinational companies mining and oil companies have taken over the land and that is where when the communities have not supported one another all of their traditions have been lost and here you can see our fishing activities we have also had important relations in the communities within a people each nationality has its own techniques or practices that they develop for fishing to carry out different activities they know many species in their own languages roughly 277 77 species are the ones that we know in our own languages and it would be good to compare the names of the species amongst our communities what are the scientific names of the species that we know we haven't really looked into this we haven't explored the flora and fauna from the geostanpoint but we have so many species and as nationalities we have a small community system where dynamite explosions are prohibited we can eat the products for our own food security but not beyond that and that is why sharing our experiences has been so important in order to carry out conservation of many of the resources that our communities are now losing so that the coming generations will be able to see the species that still exist in our communities that is why when it comes to hunting it is important. Hambi is a poison developed by men and it requires a lot of time to make it using techniques and medicinal plants and Hambi is a poison that can kill an animal you can also hunt with bloke and spears the tip of the spear is poison and that kills the animal and it is cheap because they can develop their own livelihoods and within their own communities how they live their lives in order to have food security and then we have the bodoqueras, the blowguns then spears, hooks, arrows also used for fishing and this has been important for all the different communities and nationality medicinal plants ancestral medicinal plants that our communities have are also extremely important because many of the communities have used them since ancient times and the forests are essential because it is from the forests that animals or aquatic species are caught and used so that these species are used together with plants to make medicinal remedies and in many communities these traditional practices are still applied to making of medicinal plants there are many different species that are known in the nationality's own languages and being a part of this exploration that we're carrying out some of us don't know them while our grandparents do know them and it is important for them to hand them down to convey them to their future generations as a conclusion we have seven different nationalities in the area and we conservation explore with the indigenous cosmo vision that our nationalities have in this province and we have also recommended the governance to be independent through the indigenous cosmo vision our vision of the world to reach sustainable development because each of the territories maintains its vision of the world and manage the resources it is important so that multinational companies to prevent multinational companies from affecting our communities and causing them to lose their customs, their traditions and culture we also have ancestral and western knowledge it is important nowadays to know about other cultures because we are globalized, globalization is moving forward and so it is important to have knowledge of the reality of the world and what is happening with climate change now this is what I can tell you about our experience and I'm here to answer any questions should you wish to make any. Thank you very much Mr. De Hoa this was a very inspiring and important presentation and I'm very grateful that we have your perspective as part of our program today so with thanks to all our speakers I'm proud and happy to introduce the director of FAO's Forestry Division Mehta Wilkie for closing comments the floor is yours. Thank you so much and first and foremost thank you so so much to the speakers for this series of fascinating presentations with perspectives from around the globe we see that in spite of the challenges there's a lot of value in intersectoral collaboration across ecosystems I'd also like to sincerely thank the audience for your comments your questions, your enthusiasm we are all benefitting from the very active discussion in the chat and I hope that all the panelists will have time to answer some of your questions and that this discussion will continue into the future the evidence that we've heard today demonstrate the possibility but also the difficulty of implementing integrated approaches to achieve socially, economically and ecologically balanced development across large and very complex watersheds in order to deliver on the sustainable development goals but it's not only necessary to think across disciplines and come up with innovative solutions it's equally important to ensure broad participation of stakeholders as we've heard and this can help make the true value of ecosystems services visible, can help to better inform management and the tradeoffs and can help sustain ecosystem services to benefit human society broad participation of stakeholders can also help a balanced and sustainable development and an equitable distribution of the benefits many of the most successful strategies prioritized co-management with local communities using their extensive local knowledge that we've just heard of ecosystem functions by diversity and priorities for effective restoration measures FIO is just developing a new strategic framework with four outcomes better production, better nutrition better environment and a better life that framework is well suited to try to address these issues and help countries meet in particularly the sustainable development goal 14 life below water and sustainable development goal 15 life on land and as we've seen today the management of freshwater systems is inherently multi-disciplinary FIO initiatives for multi-disciplinary work has catalyzed this joint forestry and fisheries event and we anticipate additional joint activities supported by what we call the multi-disciplinary fund in Sambia Colombia and Papua New Guinea Manoel Barones at the beginning spoke about the importance of forest for fish so I want to talk a little bit about the importance of fish in land fisheries provide food and livelihoods to riparian communities who are then better able to manage their forest resources sustainably in land fish may also supply the nutrients that feed the forest itself Pacific salmon transport nutrients hundreds of kilometers from the ocean to the forest streams where they spawn and die nutrients from the fish transport to forest soils where they support the growth of trees similarly the Cayman of the Amazon river feeding in productive lagoons and then moving to less productive areas fertilized floodplain forests and across many tropical rivers fruit eating fish promote forest diversity by selectively dispersing seeds of fruit trees within their river networks so in these systems fish are even the potential engines of forest restoration the absolutely fantastic biodiversity represented by inland fisheries contributes to the overall health of forested systems many groups consider fisheries and biodiversity conservation to be competing objectives but experiences show that inland fisheries and biodiversity conservation are supported and all the examples of inland fisheries restoration explored to date have demonstrated significant co-benefits of improved biodiversity local communities exhibiting a high degree of knowledge and awareness of both the aquatic and terrestrial biodiversity and in particular their interdependencies are motivated to sustain the fish the forest and the linkages essential to them both also want to talk to you a little bit about the United Nations Decade on Ecosystem Restoration which runs from this year 2021 to 2030 it is co-led by FAO and the United Nations Environment Programme it's a rally in call for the protection and revival of ecosystems all types of ecosystems all around the world for the benefit of people as we've heard today freshwater ecosystems are essential elements of all landscape scale restoration plans and the Decade on Ecosystem Restoration is an opportunity to bring together multiple existing data and knowledge stream within FAO and between FAO and other organizations including data, fisheries, agriculture forestry, water resources and effective work we're hoping will also help utilize FAO's considerable knowledge base knowledge that's spread across our divisions on sustainable inland fisheries on sustainable forest management sustainable land management landscape restoration integrated water resources management so do reach out to us if you want some more information about what we are doing in those areas of work I also want to say that this Decade on the Ecosystem Restoration provides a particularly opportunity to make the goods and services provided by freshwater ecosystem more visible in policy arenas and I would encourage you all to take advantage of that the value of these ecosystems is often not fully recognized and therefore may be given low priority invasive development strategies so they will benefit from increased awareness which can be generated through this Decade and those awareness in particularly of the far reaching impact of land and water use across watersheds and of the need for an integrated approach to management so I hope you will be active participants in this UN Decade we will have a formal launch of the Decade on the 5th of June on World Environment Day and I know there's a lot of activities planned in that as well. With that I'd like to thank all our speakers, all our participants those who are up very early and those who are up very late for your participation and for your enthusiasm and as we are getting closer to the afternoon here in Rome we wish our colleagues who are observing Ramadan a very joyful Eid al-Fitr celebration tomorrow. Thank you all very much for this event bye for now.