Three initiatives from Guayaquil are the finalists of the ‘green awards’

A new edition of the Latin American Green Awards (PLV) will take place from 23 to 25 August and Ecuador is among the finalists with four cases. This event brings together, exhibits and rewards the best socio-environmental initiatives of the continent. And Guayaquil is “present” with three of the cases are among the finalists. One finalist case is from Quito.

1. RESTORATION OF THE DRY FOREST. This proposal was initiated 26 years ago by the Pro Bosque foundation. Erick Horsmant, who heads the organization and the work, said that they sought to restore the dry forest with the reforestation of the Cerro Blanco Protected Forest, since at that time (1990) deforestation was evident to turn the space into pastures.

2. IMPACT AND RESPONSE MECHANISMS OF BACTERIAL COMMUNITY IN THE SEDIMENT, CAUSED BY THE PRESENCE OF HEAVY METALS IN THE ESTUARY. This is the proposal of Juan Carlos Fernandez and consisted in analyzing the high levels of heavy metals in the sediment of the estuary.

Fernandez is a Senescyt scholarship holder and is completing his doctoral studies in Biology at the Laboratory of Marine Microbiology at the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile. As part of his training he is required to conduct a new study that is also a significant contribution to society. “The estuary was a good model for study.”

3. THE DEVELOPMENT OF SUBMARINE ROBOTS FOR ANTARCTIC EXPLORATION. The third case is proposed by Arturo Cadena Torres. The project was tested in 2012 when the device was plunged into the Antartic seafloor for an hour, and it recorded the habitat and collected some starfish for further study. This initiative seeks that “through the knowledge of the oceans we can protect them; since we can not protect something we do not know.”