¿Cómo medir las condiciones para el emprendimiento? Una propuesta para la Amazonía Ecuatoriana / How to measure the entrepreneurship frameworks? A proposal for the Ecuadorian Amazon

Frente a los desafíos actuales, el emprendimiento se presenta como una herramienta para afrontar los nuevos retos, ante esto las universidades se ven obligadas a contribuir mediante la investigación o la acción. A partir de esto el trabajo propone lineamientos generales para el estudio de las condiciones de emprendimiento en la Amazonía ecuatoriana, tomando en cuenta las características únicas de la zona. A través de una revisión bibliográfica y documental fundamentada en la experiencia internacional, nacional y local. Concluyó que los lineamentos más adecuados para el estudio del emprendimiento en esta región son: Área Gubernamental, Educación y Formación Emprendedora, Infraestructura Física y de Servicios, y Talento Humano.

The socioeconomic determinants of timber use in the buffer zone of the Sumaco Napo Galeras National Park, Ecuadorian Amazon

Este trabajo evalúa las determinantes socioeconómicas del uso forestal maderable, tipos de ingresos económicos y la dependencia del aprovechamiento de madera a nivel de hogares en poblaciones indígenas kichwas y colonas/mestizas asentadas en la Región Amazónica Ecuatoriana (RAE). Los datos se obtuvieron a través de una encuesta socioeconómica en 180 hogares, realizada en siete comunidades de la parroquia Hatun Sumaku. Los resultados indicaron que, en promedio, los ingresos económicos son un 12% mayor para los hogares colonos/mestizos (USD 2787.68) que para los hogares kichwa (USD 2445.45), para quienes en esta zona su principal ingreso económico es el aprovechamiento de madera (33%), mientras que para los colonos/mestizos el 3% dado que sus ingresos principales provienen de actividades fuera de la finca (43%) a diferencia de los Kichwa (17%). El modelo de regresión Probit mostró que el área en bosques secundarios y el acceso a comunicación celular influyen positivamente en el aprovechamiento maderero, mientras que las áreas en cultivos influyen negativamente en la probabilidad de que un hogar decida aprovechar madera del bosque.

Extreme citizens science for climate justice: linking pixel to people for mapping gas flaring in Amazon Rainforest

In the Ecuadorian Amazon - one of Earth's last high-biodiversity wilderness areas and home to uncontacted indigenous populations – 50 years of widespread oil development is jeopardizing biodiversity and feeding environmental conflicts. In 2019, a campaign to eliminate oil-related gas flaring, led by Amazonian communities impacted by fossil fuel production, resulted in an injunction against the Ecuadoran Ministry of Energy and Non-Renewable Natural Resources and the Ministry of Environment and Water. On January 26, 2021 the Court of Nueva Loja issued a historical order to ban gas flaring in the Ecuadorian Amazon. The present Citizen Science project plaied an important role in this process, enabling the production of independent spatial information through participatory mapping with indigenous and farmer communities. Globally, lack of independent information about oil activities has led to the monitoring of gas flaring by satellite imagery, achieving remarkable results. However, apart from institutional and remotely sensed data, reliable spatial information on gas flaring in the Ecuadorian Amazon is not available. Therefore, we adopted the Community-Based Participatory Action Research approach to develop a Participatory GIS process, aiming both to provide reliable data and to support social campaigns for environmental and climate justice. This work presents the first participatory mapping initiative of gas flaring at a regional scale, carried out completely through open source data and software. Having identified 295 previously unmapped gas flaring sites through participatory mapping, we highlight that the extent of gas flaring activities is well beyond the official data provided by the Ecuadorian Ministry of Environment and NOAA Nightfire annual datasets, which map only 24% and 33% of the sites, respectively. 75 of the detected sites were in the Yasuní Biosphere Reserve. Moreover, 39 of the identified sites were venting instead of flaring, a phenomenon never before documented in the Ecuadorian Amazon. This study demonstrates that, because official datasets and satellite imagery underestimate the extent of gas flaring in the Ecuadorian Amazon, community-based mapping offers a promising alternative for producing trusted, community-based scientific data. This community-produced data can support campaigns for legal recognition of human rights and environmental justice in the Ecuadorian Amazon. Finally, this study shows how local environmental conflicts can foster policy transformations that promote climate justice.

Environmental Impact Assessment of Remediation Strategy in an Oil Spill in the Ecuadorian Amazon Region

Past petroleum-extraction activities in Ecuador have contaminated its Amazon region. To assess the environmental impact attributed to remediation activities regarding the cleanup of these oil spills, two scenarios were studied according to Life Cycle Analysis methodology: (1) No-action, which means to leave the contamination in place without any further action and (2) Environmental remediation, where the environmental-load attributed to the remediation of the representative oil spill was studied. Results indicated that the no-action scenario presented a higher environmental impact for 12 out of the 16 environmental categories evaluated (climate change, ozone depletion, human toxicity non-cancer effects, particulate matter, ionizing radiation human health, ionizing radiation ecosystem, photochemical ozone formation, acidification, terrestrial eutrophication, marine eutrophication, freshwater ecotoxicity, mineral, fossil and renewable resource depletion). Moreover, the no-action scenario presented a global weighted score of contamination of 5.45 points, while the remediation scenario got a score of 3.3 points, which means that the remediation decreased by 39% of the global environmental impact due to the remediation activity applied, showing the positive influence of environmental remediation to mitigate the effects attributed to the presence of pollution sources associated to the petroleum industry in the Ecuadorian Amazon region.

A scientific note of pest-insects associated with stingless bee hive Melipona eburnea in the Ecuadorian Amazon Region

Bees are the primary pollinators in nature. However, climate change, excessive use of fertilizers and invasive species have caused the decline of bee colonies. Therefore, this study aimed to analyze the presence of pests in colonies of Melipona eburnea. For this, the colonies of M. eburnea were examined during the honey extraction process. We found 4 different pests associated with the physical conditions of colonies and the fragile defense of the bees against the invaders. In conclusion, this report of the presence of pests is to alert researchers and meliponicultures to prevent the decline of stingless bees.