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Rainforest Alliance to Support Study of Brazil Nuts in Western AmazonAmy Duchelle, PhD Awarded 2005-2007 Kleinhans Fellowship to Study Viability of Brazil Nuts in Face of Major Highway DevelopmentMay 17, 2005
New York -- The Rainforest Alliance is pleased to announce that Amy Duchelle has been awarded the 2005-2007 Kleinhans Fellowship, which will allow her to study the production of Brazil nuts in the face of major landscape changes in the Western Amazon. Specifically, she will examine how the production of these nuts, a popular non-timber forest product (NTFP) and important source of income for communities in the area, is affected by the construction of the Transoceanic Highway. This new road promises to have a huge impact on the region, by linking the Amazon river port of Assis in Brazil with Pacific Ocean ports in Peru.
"By comparing current forest policies and management approaches, I hope to provide insights into the value of extractive areas for maintaining Brazil nut productivity and conserving forests in the face of rapid infrastructural change," explains Duchelle, a Ph.D. student at the University of Florida, Gainesville. Duchelle is focusing specifically on extractive reserves where the nuts are harvested, in the tri-national frontier region of Bolivia, Peru and Brazil.
Extractive reserves, like the one in Acre, Brazil that was started by slain rubber tapper Chico Mendes, are conservation areas where the government awards collective, long-term, land-use rights to forest communities for the sustainable harvest of NTFPs such as spices, fruits, nuts, resins and medicinal plants. These reserves provide a sanctuary in the face of logging, farming, mining and other environmentally destructive practices.
Duchelle says she hopes that by exploring various factors such as forest policies, deforestation, Brazil nut harvesting and management practices and regeneration, her research will provide "insights into the relationships between forest policy, road development and the future of Brazil nut production in extractive reserves in the Western Amazon." She is focusing specifically on three reserves in Brazil, Peru and Bolivia.
"For over a dozen years the Kleinhans Fellowship has been supporting pivotal research on the use of nontimber forest products and how they can be used as a tool to conserve tropical forests," explains Rainforest Alliance founder and board chair Daniel Katz. "Kleinhans Fellows are leaders in the field and have helped to change the way that forest products are used."
Kleinhans fellows are chosen by a seven-member committee made up of non-timber forest products experts from a range of institutions, including the New York Botanical Garden and the Wildlife Conservation Society. Recent Kleinhans fellowship recipients include Carla Morsello, who studied the commercialization of NTFPs in the Brazilian Amazon and potential consequences for local indigenous communities and forest conservation; Catarina Illsley Granich, who developed a management plan for the production of mezcal in peasant communities of Mexico; Silvia E. Purata, who studied the role of markets in NTFP certifications in Oaxaca, Mexico; and Campbell Plowden, who studied the ecology, management and marketing of NTFPs in the Alto Rio Guamá Indigenous Reserve of the Brazilian Amazon.
Read more about the Kleinhans Fellowship.
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