Water & Population: Toward a sustainable future, Calakmul Biosphere Reserve

The Calakmul Biosphere Reserve is an unique resource that combines the historic legacy of the Mayans with the mosaic of tall and medium forests and wetlands, while also home to a great wealth of fauna such as jaguar, tapir, Spider and Howler Monkey, King Vulture, Eagle, and Jabiru Stork, among others. The existence of 350 species of birds, 380 species of butterflies, 18 species of amphibians and 75 species of reptiles has been reported.

The political support for development of chicle (gum) and logging exploitation concessions; the establishments of the first populated centers; the politics of colonization of the humid tropics, and finally the creation of the municipality of Calakmul, are moments that help one to understand the population dynamics. This is characterized by extensive rapid growth in the region as well as accelerated transformation and use of important natural resources.

Currently, the infrastructure and services in the Municipality of Calakmul are weak: a significant percentage of the ejidos (communal land cooperatives) lack electricity, face water scarcity and generally lack services to provide potable water. Water is provided to the more remote ejidos only through jagüeye (man-made flooded areas), aljibes (rainwater cisterns), aguadas (natural seasonal flooded areas), which only exist in some ejidos, and/or by pipes that carry water from the municipal center at Xpujil.

The Water and Population Project integrates environmental and conservation themes with themes relating to health and gender.

Objectives

To generate basic information concerning water quality, use and demand in the communities of Nuevo Becal and 20 de Noviembre.
To provide basic information and education on environment and population themes
To identify mechanisms of coordination and linkage with local, regional, national and international organizations that share common objectives concerning environment and population

Expectations

To characterize the use, demand and quality of water in two communities, in order to identify strategies and actions that permit the communities to improve their quality of life, specifically their health. To identify strategies for the provision of potable water to the population and impart to the community, especially to the women, basic environmental and health information.

Results

In collaboration with the National Water Commission (CNA), an analysis of water quality was carried out in the ejidos and in all samples taken e. coli bacteria contamination was discovered. The information has been made available to the health sector for input into their official programs.

In recent surveys, it was determined that that only 50% of the families boil drinking water. Another statistic shows that 70% of the surveyed families in the communities of Nuevo Becal and 20 de Noviembre depend on collected rainwater for their personal use. The majority of these families maintain that the government should be responsible for providing them with a permanent water supply, but more than 60% believe that the community themselves should be charged with maintaining such a water supply.

In addition, diverse activities have been carried out with the youth from the Municipality of Calakmul, as a forum to share environment and health information. At the same time, the programs support the training of project personnel and knowledge exchanges with other organizations from the local to international scale.