Rainforest of the Austrians

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Austrian Rainforest is a nature conservation project that was founded in 1991 by Michael Schnitzler and is supported by an association . He tries to 146.1 km² Esquinas - rainforest in southern Costa Rica by purchasing land of the free purchased land in the existing and the introduction of Piedras Blancas National Park to protect.

history

The rainforest area used to be owned by farmers from the surrounding villages. In order to stop the clearing of the rainforest by the farmers, the government of Costa Rica declared the area a national park in 1991 .

However, since the government lacked the money to buy all the land and thus to permanently protect the entire area, it was dependent on outside help in the implementation of its nature conservation plans. The plots of land bought by the association - 34.7 km² at the end of 2007 - were given the symbolic name “Rainforest of the Austrians”. Due to further protection initiatives, 99 km², that is around 67% of the Esquinas rainforest, are now owned by the national park. 48 km² are still privately owned and are to be acquired over the next few years and incorporated into the national park. The association finances the employment of two game rangers and supports reintroduction projects for endangered species as well as social projects in the community of La Gamba. The La Gamba tropical station has set itself the goal of making a contribution to research into tropical rainforests.

Michael Schnitzler received the Austrian State Prize for the Environment (Konrad Lorenz Prize) in 1995. In 2000, the Rainforest Association of Austrians received the Binding Prize for Nature and Environmental Protection ( Liechtenstein ). The Natural History Museum Vienna has dedicated a special exhibition to the project. The ORF showed a documentary about the project in the television series " Universum ".

See also

Web links