Por Kendra Sitton | Editor<\/p>\n
Local environmental nonprofit Nature and Culture International is being featured in the award-winning public television series \u201cThe Visionaries,\u201d with an episode airing on PBS examining the work the conservation organization does in Latin America to save irreplaceable forests, plants and animals found nowhere else in the world.<\/p>\n
In a recent phone interview, Nature and Culture\u2019s President and CEO Matt Clark detailed the work of the nonprofit.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe help to legally designate lands as protected areas. Once we\u2019ve helped legally create a reserve, we help to make sure it is effectively managed by ensuring that there are appropriate management structures, there is available funding for the management, there are local communities who receive training,\u201d Clark said. \u201cAll of our work is what we call bottom up, so the work comes from local communities and reflects what they want to do rather than us coming from the outside and going to our vision of what we think should happen.\u201d<\/p>\n
He also said the episode would be interesting to a wide range of people.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think they [San Diegans] are gonna see some beautiful scenery, so anyone who\u2019s interested in nature will enjoy it. I think what makes it different than a traditional nature program is the cultural aspect. You\u2019re gonna meet people from Ecuador and Peru \u2013 get to know them and see what their lives are like. I think that human element is interesting,\u201d Clark said. \u201cAnd then the connection to the global issues, so anyone who\u2019s interested in the larger issues of climate change, loss of biodiversity, loss of functioning ecosystems. I think that will resonate with people.\u201d<\/p>\n
The \u201cGuardians of the Forest\u201d episode follows two parallel storylines: farmer Do\u00f1a Omaida\u2019s work in rural Ecuador to preserve her local forest through Nature and Culture International and Carlsbad resident Ivan Gaylor\u2019s journey to found the nonprofit.<\/p>\n
Clark said Omaida is a longtime partner of Nature and Culture through her work as the coordinator of an agricultural association near the protected area featured in the episode. In addition, the agricultural association she works for has benefitted from Nature and Culture\u2019s water program.<\/p>\n
The producer and director of the episode, Jody Santos, said working with Gaylor and others passionate about saving forest ecosystems was her favorite part of creating \u201cGuardians of the Forest.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cTo them, climate change isn’t a headline but a daily reality, and they have invested their lives in doing triage on saving what’s left,\u201d Santos said in a recent email interview.<\/p>\n
Santos said the San Diego-based nonprofit was chosen over other organizations that applied to be featured in the series because of how the group operates with a focus on putting people and cultures first when protecting ecosystems.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey don’t protect threatened ecosystems by putting fences around them and telling people to keep out. They work with indigenous communities in key ways,\u201d Santos said. \u201cFirst, they do outreach to these communities, emphasizing the importance of a healthy environment on everything from tourism to farming. Second, they work with communities on creating livelihoods that are less destructive to the forests and waterways \u2014 helping people move away from logging and mining, for instance, toward more sustainable practices like ecotourism and sugar cane farms.\u201d<\/p>\n
Parts of the episode were filmed in Ecuador and Peru. According to Santos, at the current rate of deforestation in Peru, all the forest will be gone within 50 years.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe all depend on nature for things we need \u2013 clean water, clean air. I could generate a list of 50 things. The thing I find very salient for a San Diego audience who might think Latin America is a long ways away is that the Amazon forest is big enough that it actually impacts our weather in the United States; it impacts our climate,\u201d Clark said. \u201cAnyone who\u2019s interested or cares about climate change, is concerned about increasingly bad wildfires and the drought and floods, so on and so forth, should care about what happens in the Amazon.\u201d<\/p>\n
The 23rd season of \u201cThe Visionaries\u201d is hosted by actor Sam Waterson, best known for his roles in \u201cThe Newsroom\u201d and \u201cGrace and Frankie.\u201d The 12 half-hour episodes span the globe as the documentary-makers follow the lives of ordinary people tackling some of the most intractable problems the world faces.<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe that the central idea of \u2018The Visionaries\u2019 \u2013 doing what you can about huge, intractable problems \u2013 is an idea worth encouraging,\u201d Waterston said in a press release.<\/p>\n
San Diego\u2019s KPBS2 is airing \u201cGuardians of the Forest\u201d on April 20, 2019, at 5 p.m.<\/p>\n