ClimatePrep

Daytime shot of Olive Ridley hatchling (Lepidochelys olivacea), taken from above on the sand, Junquillal beach, Pacific coast of Costa Rica. © Carlos Drews, WWF-International

In this third and final installment of a three part series on WWF’s Latin American and Caribbean Program’s coastal adaptation projects in Costa Rica, Valerie Guthrie discusses the community’s efforts to educate and actively involve Junquillal’s youngest inhabitants in WWF’s  adaptation work.

Communities matter. This is the foundation for our work helping sea turtles and the people of Junquillal prepare for the increasingly severe impacts associated with climate change.

For this reason, myself and a team of others at WWF have worked with the community of Junquillal to develop an experimental program that aims to integrate children in helping our community adjust to climate change.  However, while our work focuses on sea turtles, our planning did not start with them. We started by asking ourselves a simple question, “What’s the best way to teach children, young people, and adults about a global problem that has direct local effects where they live?”

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In this second installment of a three part series on WWF’s Latin American and Caribbean Program’s coastal adaptation projects in Costa Rica, Ana Fonseca, the Latin America and Caribbean lead with WWF-LAC, together with Carlos Drews discusses the community’s efforts to adapt – both for the turtles and themselves.

Extraordinary high tides accompanied by intense wave action erode many meters of beach covered by vegetation on Junquillal Beach. © Gabriel Francia-WWF y Nicola Lorusso

The fortunes of coastal communities like Junquillal are intimately tied to the sea and the shoreline that sits just meters away from houses and roads, a relationship shared by species like sea turtles, for whom the beach is the sole nesting site. Coastlines are not static however, but instead shift according to storms, currents, and changing sea levels. Scientists warn that the sea-level could rise by at least one meter by the end of the century due to climate change, threatening both coastal communities as well as critically important turtle nesting sites like Junquillal.

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By Eliot Levine, WWF-US

As part of ClimatePrep.org’s continuing feature on sea turtles and adaptation, we interviewed Marianne Fish, Program Leader for Marine and Coastal Adaptation with WWF – Latin America and the Caribbean. She spoke about incorporating adaptation into existing conservation efforts, “no regrets” strategies, and how sea turtles are a focal species for adaptation projects in part because they make use of many of the same coastal and marine habitats that are critical to humans – beaches, coral reefs, and mangroves.

Junquillal students monitor temperature differences among sand samples © WWF - LAC

By Eliot Levine, WWF-US

Junquillal Beach in the north Pacific of Costa Rica is a representative example of many places in Latin American and the Caribbean where wildlife and communities are already feeling the impacts of climate change. In 2005, with the support of the community, WWF started the project “Conservation of Pacific Leatherbacks” (in Spanish, Conservación – Baulas del Pacífico (CBP)). The CBP Program includes the monitoring and protection of sea turtle nesting sites, community education and training programs, and the development of flooding maps for the Junquillal area.

In this three part series, Gabriel Francia, Ana Fonseca, and Valerie Guthrie from WWF’s Latin American and Caribbean Program will discuss their efforts to work with communities and integrate the latest climate science and mapping technologies as part of a multi-faceted sea turtle and coastal adaptation project in Costa Rica. A previous entry on ClimatePrep featured a video from Junquillal.

In this entry, Gabriel Francia discusses the community’s efforts to adapt – both for the turtles and themselves.

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