[Editor's Note: This is a companion article to the 2007 Annual Report]
By MAGGIE I. JARUZEL
Eduardo Gudynas scouts new frontiers in the Amazon and Andean regions of the world, but not in the way most people would suspect.
“We explore new problems and also new perspectives for well-known problems,” said the director of the Uruguayan Study Center of Appropriate Technologies in Montevideo.
“We’ve been exploring the impact of biofuels on the region for many years so when the topic made headlines in 2007, we already had finished critical reviews and analyses.”
Staff members at the study center also seek environmentally sound alternatives to large infrastructure projects such as roads, bridges and dams funded by international financial institutions (IFIs).
“One of the main criticisms of those who work on environmental and social issues is that we rely too much on complaining and denouncing,” Gudynas said.
“Decisionmakers usually ask, ‘OK, so what’s your alternative?’ We work heavily on providing alternatives.”
Since 1985, the center has researched and promoted development projects that are environmentally, socially and economically sustainable. Staff members work in Uruguay and other southern South American countries, including Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Ecuador and Paraguay.
The Mott Foundation has provided six grants to the center totaling almost $720,000 since 2000 to help address sustainable development issues.
One of its successes has been to help change the way people view environmental challenges, Gudynas says. Now citizens see them as cross-border issues rather than isolated national concerns.
With the center’s prodding, decisionmakers at all levels have come to understand the importance of sharing policies and practices across borders as a way to better use the continent’s natural resources.
For example, there is currently a strong push for an international network of highways and bridges throughout the region, Gudynas says. Many isolated rural residents would welcome quicker and shorter access to education and medical centers.
But those same people also want to ensure that the projects will be regulated. That way, adverse impacts are minimized — not just in specific pockets with strong policies, but regionwide — because what happens in one country directly affects others nearby.
In addition to pushing for governmental cooperation, the center serves as a coordinator so local, national and regional non-governmental organizations (NGOs) can share information about current or proposed IFI-funded projects.
By either hosting and/or helping sponsor more than a half dozen workshops annually — some of which are conducted via Internet and e-mail — the center can share relevant and timely information with people living in the most remote corners of South America.
“We consider the NGOs as spiders,” Gudynas said. “We are small, we move fast and we spin webs that connect different environmental and social groups in many countries.”
Electronic communication also makes it possible for the center to identify local people who are interested in sustainable development issues, but who probably couldn’t attend national or regional gatherings. Gudynas points to a previous Internet training session to illustrate how the center's work empowers people with knowledge and hands-on skills.
In that case, a man who had enrolled in the training course was the only person with Internet access in his small town in the Andean highlands of Peru. Consequently, he served as a liaison between the center and his community, downloading information and sharing it during regular local meetings.
“Each week, these people living in a remote town — the so-called ‘roof of the world’ — were waiting for our documents,” Gudynas said.
“After they got them, they would reply with their answers and experiences.”
Knowing that the center's work helps improve daily life for people throughout the continent is not only rewarding but also humbling, he says, because there is still a lot left to do.
“We are witnesses of the last large remains of the natural heritage in Latin America,” Gudynas said.
“We have the potential to preserve that heritage while using it wisely to eradicate poverty. But we also have the potential to destroy it.
“Through our work, we are able to see that there are not just a few but many alternative options to reach a sustainable development pathway.”