ECUADOR / CONSERVATION (06:39)

11 July 2009

ECUADOR / CONSERVATION (06:39)

Decades of oil drilling in Ecuador has devastated huge swaths of the Amazon rain forest and its wildlife, threatening to destroy the ancestral homes of native tribes and their culture. But some of those people are finding a way to balance development and conservation. UNTV

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Full Script

STORY: ECUADOR / CONSERVATION 
TRT: 6.39 
SOURCE: 21st CENTURY / LA TELEVISION, (ECUADORIAN TV) 
RESTRICTIONS: NONE 
LANGUAGE: SPANISH / ENGLISH / NATS

DATELINE: OCTOBER 2009, YASUNI NATIONAL PARK, ECUADOR

SHOTLIST:

OCTOBER 2009, YASUNI NATIONAL PARK, ECUADOR

1. Various shots, Amazon jungle

FILE - LA TELEVISION – DATE UNKNOWN, YASUNI NATIONAL PARK

2. Various shots, parakeets feeding

OCTOBER 2009, YASUNI NATIONAL PARK, ECUADOR

3. Wide shot, tourists sailing in a canoe 
4. Various shot, birds, lizard and monkeys 
5. Med shot, tourists in canoes 
6. Various shots, bird on tree branch

FILE - LA TELEVISION – DATE UNKNOWN, YASUNI NATIONAL PARK

7. Med shot, otters in water

OCTOBER 2009, YASUNI NATIONAL PARK, ECUADOR

8. Various shots, forest 
9. Med shot, tourists walking in forest 
10. Close up, oil on soil 
11. Various shots, women walking in forest 
12. SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Giovanni Rivadneira, Quechua: 
“Oil has spilled all over the Amazon River.” 
13. Med shot, giovanni in a conoe 
14. Wide shot, canoe on water with people 
15. SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Giovanni Rivadneira, Quechua: 
“With all the exploitation that has been done, the community has gotten absolutely nothing. We don’t have water, we don’t have a good education, and we don’t have good health.” 
16. Wide shot, oil platform from water 
17. Various shots, oil platform 
18. Various shots, oil pipes 
19. Various shots, road construction 
20. Close up, pool of oil 
21. Various shots, woman harvesting banana 
22. Various shots, woman inside her home hand washing seeds in bowl 
23. Tilt up, man stitching net 
24. Wide shot, man getting onto a canoe 
25. Med shot, women carrying banana basket on her back 
26. Med shot, boy standing by a door 
27. Med shot, women carrying banana basket on her back arrives to her home 
28. SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Giovanni Rivadneira, Quechua: 
“In one community meeting, I said we could build something here in this beautiful place God has given us. Here in the forest, we have everything. So I proposed to my community to work in sustainable tourism.” 
29. Med shot, woman carrying baby picks up a sed and hands it to another baby on Givanni’s back 
30. Various shots, men building a tour centre 
31. Med shot, ore on water 
32. Wide shot, lodging centre 
33. Various shots, centre 
34. Various shots, Fausto in kitchen 
35. SOUNDBITE (English) Fausto Cornejo, manager, lodging Centre: 
“We do not discharge anything to the soil or to the lake.   All the water that comes from the toilet and from the kitchen goes to the septic tanks. These septic tanks will distribute the gray water and black water to a system of wetlands.” 
36. Various shots, lodging centre 
37. Various shots, septic tank 
39. Med shot, Fausto showing grass 
39. NAT SOUND (English) Fausto Cornejo, manager, lodging Centre: 
“You see the grass, this one. This is the grass that is purifying all the grey water and black water.” 
40. Close up, grass 
41. SOUNDBITE (English) Fausto Cornejo, conservationist: 
 “Every two months, we test the water that comes out, and gives us around 95 percent free of bacteria, and that means it’s purer than the lake.” 
42. Wide shot, tourists in canoe 
43. Various shots, Fausto showing solar panels 
44. Various shots, Tatiana and Giovanni on canopy tower   
45. Pan right, from deck to a room 
46. SOUNDBITE (English) Tatiana Calderone, UN World Tourism Organization (WTO): 
“We think sustainable tourism is a key to any conservation or preservation programs. That’s the model we could find in Napo Wildlife Centre... We want to apply that model in other communities.” 
47. Wide shot, tourists   
48. SOUNDBITE (English) Visitor: 
“I think this is an excellent idea. This is better than some multinational large motel operation. This is what the indigenous peoples need.”   
49. Various shots, canoe with tourists 
50. SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Giovanni Rivadneira, Quechua: 
“We want to show everyone there are many job opportunities by taking care of the forest. Working for an oil company is not the only way. I am very proud to be part of a project that is going to give us profit and this   profit is going to be invested in education, health, culture and protecting our environment.”     
51. Wide shot, woman coming down stairs, and leaving lodge 
52. Various shots, boat with tourists on lake

STORYLINE:

Its early morning. A loud screeching noise fills the air. Appearing in twos and fours, the parakeets and parrots arrive. They descend from the rainforest, branch by branch, to the clay bank below.

They come for the mineral rich clay – an antidote to the toxins in the nuts and seeds.

This corner of the Ecuadorian Amazon jungle is the Yasuni National Park. It’s a lush habitat for many kinds of plants and wildlife. The park contains more species of flora and fauna than all of North America.

Tourists from around the world come to see the dramatic diversity of life – more than five hundred fifty recorded species of birds, and the endangered giant otters.

The Yasuni National Park covers two and a half million acres of rainforest in the easternmost part of Ecuador. The park is known as one of the most bio-diverse places on earth, and UNESCO designated the area as a biosphere reserve to protect its wildlife and to ensure sustainable livelihoods. 
  
But the park also sits on large oil deposits.  And behind its seemingly peaceful lushness lies a struggle by the indigenous peoples to protect their ancestral land against reckless exploitation by oil companies.

SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Giovanni Rivadneira, Quechua 
“Oil has spilled all over the Amazon River.”

Giovanni Rivadneira is a Quechua Indian from the Anangu community.

SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Giovanni Rivadneira, Quechua 
“With all the exploitation that has been done, the community has gotten absolutely nothing. We don’t have water, we don’t have a good education, and we don’t have good health.”

Lured by the quick money offered by oil companies, some communities have allowed them to extract oil on their land.

Amazon crude production has been the main source of revenues that keeps Ecuador’s economy afloat.  But four decades of oil exploitation has left a legacy of deforestation and pollution, threatening not only the plant and animals, but also the lives of indigenous people.

Living inside the Yasuni Park, people in the Anangu community are struggling to make ends meet.

Some 300,000 indigenous peoples call the rainforest home. Many are hunters, gatherers and small-scale farmers. Job opportunities have been scarce.

Ten years ago, they came up with an economic alternative that would provide jobs and keep oil companies from destroying their ancestral land.

SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Giovanni Rivadneira, Quechua 
“In one community meeting, I said we could build something here in this beautiful place God has given us. Here in the forest, we have everything. So I proposed to my community to work in sustainable tourism.”

With seed money from a non-governmental group, people in Anangu started to design and build the tour centre by themselves.  It took five years to complete.

Called the Napo Wildlife Centre, it’s the first native owned and operated lodge in the Yasuni National Park; and a certified ecological destination in Ecuador.

Fausto Cornejo was hired by the community to help manage the business. He is making sure that the lodge maintains its commitment to conservation.

SOUNDBITE (English) Fausto Cornejo, conservationist: 
 “We do not discharge anything to the soil or to the lake.   All the water that comes from the toilet and from the kitchen goes to the septic tanks. These septic tanks will distribute the gray water and black water to a system of wetlands.”   (14.03”)

NAT SOUND: “You see the grass, this one. This is the grass that is purifying all the grey water and black water.”

SOUNDBITE (English) Fausto Cornejo, conservationist: 
 “Every two months, we test the water that comes out, and gives us around 95 percent free of bacteria, and that means it’s purer than the lake.”

The lodge now has four solar panels collecting energy for the electricity. The plan is to rely on solar power for all its energy needs in the future.

The Napo Wildlife Centre has caught the attention of Tatiana Calderone from the UN World Tourism Organization. She is part of a United Nations program that helps communities inside the Yasuni biosphere develop eco-friendly projects.

SOUNDBITE (English) Tatiana Calderone, UN World Tourism Organization (WTO): 
 “We think sustainable tourism is a key to any conservation or preservation programs…That’s the model we could find in Napo Wildlife Centre... We want to apply that model in other communities.”

SOUNDBITE (English) Visitor: 
“I think this is an excellent idea. This is better than some multinational large motel operation. This is what the indigenous peoples need.”

SOUNDBITE (Spanish) Giovanni Rivadneira, Quechua 
“We want to show everyone there are many job opportunities by taking care of the forest. Working for an oil company is not the only way. I am very proud to be part of a project that is going to give us profit and this   profit is going to be invested in education, health, culture and protecting our environment.

Sustainable tourism provides development and leaves a small footprint on environment. It’s a boost to the local economy and the project’s supporters are hopeful it can be a viable alternative to oil.

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