Sometimes the most appropriate form of economic development consists of retaining native forests on steep slopes where other land uses are environmentally destructive and where economic or humanitarian considerations do not override these limitations. This is especially the case when native plant and animal species are diverse and special, as, for example, in many of the forested areas found on the humid eastern slopes of Peru's Andes Mountains. The authors recently evaluated the biological diversity there. They provide a brief outline of their findings and conclusions.

Andean landscapes are rich with examples of traditional land uses that have proven sustainable over centuries, contribute to biodiversity and other natural values, and are living examples of cultural heritage. These landscapes and the diverse array of values they represent are, however, exceedingly vulnerable. As countries in the region strengthen existing national systems of protected areas, protection of these working landscapes—places where people live and work (Figure 1) —deserves greater attention and requires new and innovative approaches to conservation. Emerging trends in conservation and protected areas management are creating new opportunities to engage local people in the stewardship of the natural and cultural heritage of working landscapes. This type of community-based approach builds on years of experience yet extends conservation strategies in new ways and holds great promise as a foundation for sustainable land stewardship.

Ethnobiology has a rich tradition of understanding and documenting ecological knowledge of traditional peoples living in montane environments. These peoples and their environments currently face great threats to their continued existence. The Highland region of Chiapas, Mexico (Figure 1), in particular, is an area of interest to both ethnobiologists and development practitioners. The montane forests of this region are considered one of Conservation International's priority megadiversity hot spots. Over the last few decades, poverty, population pressure, environmental degradation, and political conflict have intensified in Chiapas. Widespread political unrest and violence continue despite a “cease-fire” between the Mexican government and supporters of the Zapatista movement that first appeared in 1994. Despite these odds, projects aiming to support traditional indigenous health care while exploring ways of conserving local biodiversity are being continued in Highland Chiapas.

Conservation of agricultural biodiversity has become an important paradigm in efforts to promote sustainable development throughout the world. This is especially the case in Andean countries, where ex situ conservation of crops has been a focus of attention since the 1970s. In Peru in the early 1990s, researchers and development specialists also focused on in situ conservation and the participation of campesino communities in mountain development processes. They designed the Cajamarca model as a result of several years of experience in rural development projects. This model includes so-called seed fairs (Figure 1) and encourages the creation of local seed banks managed by a conservationist campesino association. The HimalAndes Project, which promotes technical cooperation to support exchange of seeds and local knowledge between mountain agriculture ecosystems, is another recent project with a partial focus on agrobiodiversity conservation in Andean and other countries.

Snow leopards that prey on poor farmers' livestock pose a twofold problem: they endanger farmers' precarious mountain livelihoods as well as the survival of the snow leopard as a unique species since farmers engage in retaliatory killings. Project Snow Leopard (PSL), a recent pilot initiative in Baltistan, involves a partnership between local farmers and private enterprise in the form of an insurance scheme combined with ecotourism activities. Farmers jointly finance the insurance scheme through the payment of premiums per head of livestock they own, while the remaining funds are provided by profits from trekking expeditions focusing on the snow leopard. The insurance scheme is jointly managed by a village management committee and PSL staff. The scheme is structured in such a way that villagers monitor each other and have incentives to avoid cheating the system.

Andean ecosystems are among the most diverse and threatened ecosystems in the world. Only very general data on the extent and impacts of the transformation processes that have affected ecosystems in Colombia are available to date. This study analyzes the transformation of forests in part of the Eastern Colombian Andes, using the landscape ecological approach, with remote sensing, fieldwork, and GIS. There are two levels of analysis: a regional level (1: 500,000) covering 4.1 million ha and a subregional level (1: 50,000) covering 225,000 ha. The former covers the central portion of the East-Andean Cordillera, where the remaining forest and páramo areas were quantified and their spatial distribution analyzed. The subregional analysis level is located in the Middle Chicamocha Watershed. The effects of human activities on the ecosystems were analyzed, taking current farming systems into consideration. The historical human impact in the region has been intense, especially in the drier parts of the study area. At the regional level, only 22% of the original forests remain, of which 28.7% are located in the national parks. In the subregional study area, only 7.6% remain, mainly at altitudes of more than 3000 m. Of five identified forest types, the two with considerable covered areas were the High-Andean Polylepis Forests (33.6%) and the High-Andean mixed forests (35.1%). The original land cover of the sub-Andean dry forests has been almost totally replaced by seminatural shrublands, pastures, crops, and severely degraded areas. The largest fragments are Andean mixed forests and the Andean oak forests, with sizes up to 866 and 1182 ha. Of 19 identified farming systems at the subregional level, only 5 include substantial proportions of their original forest covers.

In the páramo ecological belt of the Venezuelan Andes, a long fallow agricultural system is used to produce potatoes and cereals. Total rainfall, surface runoff, soil moisture, drainage, and soil loss were measured in this system during two consecutive years on 10 plots cropped with potatoes and on two successional plots with fallow periods of 1 and 15 years. Total rainfall (1129 mm on average) is characterized by many low-intensity events. The low rainfall intensity and high soil infiltration capacity partly explain the very low runoff (only 1.7% of the rainfall) and the low rates of soil loss (0.58 t/ha/y) on the cultivated plots. The main water outputs were by evapotranspiration (61%) and drainage (37%). The greatest runoff and soil losses were observed at the beginning of the fallow period when the ground cover was scarce; however, after a few months of fallow, both processes decreased below the rates measured on the cultivated plots. Because soil loss was not significant on all study plots, it is suggested that traditional fallow agriculture does not have a negative environmental impact at a local scale.

We studied the seed bank and above-ground vegetation in a replicated field experiment with sites ungrazed for 22 years as well as three different grazed sites in seminatural grasslands in central Argentina. We examined the relationship between vegetation and seed bank composition, and tested 3 hypotheses predicting decrease in seed bank richness, decrease in seed bank abundance, and divergence of seed bank species composition from vegetation composition during succession. Grazing changed species abundance and the vertical structure of the vegetation but did not cause loss of species. Most of the taxa in the seed bank occurred in the vegetation. Seed bank richness, diversity, and abundance decreased significantly during grassland succession following cessation of grazing. Although in general the most abundant species in the vegetation at each site were also dominant in the respective seed bank, seed bank and vegetation composition differed greatly after cessation of grazing. The seed bank at sites undisturbed over the long term does not appear to be an important source of seedling recruitment after disturbance in these grasslands.

Lauca National Park forms a unique area of puna and prepuna ecosystems in the high Altiplano of northeastern Chile. Its extensive puna steppe shrublands lying above 4000 m and high volcanoes reaching above 6000 m provide some of many strong justifications for its designation as a UNESCO International Biosphere Reserve in 1983. The park also contains Lago Chungará, the highest lake in the world at 4518 m elevation, and a rich variety of fauna and flora. The mammal fauna of the park includes notable populations of large herbivores such as vicuña, guanaco, and huemul, and a rich diversity of rodent species. More than 140 species of birds, one third of the total Chilean bird fauna—with many rare wetland species— and more than 400 species of vascular plants occur within the park. Despite its relatively pristine natural environment, Lauca National Park faces numerous management challenges. These include the management of critical and limited water resources, the impacts of human population and tourism, management of rare and endangered species, and pressures from mining and agricultural interests to decertify areas currently within park boundaries. Expansion of the park boundary westward to include ecologically significant prepuna habitats should be a high priority of park management.

The Nanda Devi Bio sphere Reserve (NDBR) in the western Himalaya has a high level of biological and cultural diversity. The Bhotiya community, whose livelihood is highly dependent on local natural resources, inhabits the buffer zone of NDBR. Bhotiya practice seasonal and altitudinal migration and stay inside the buffer zone of NDBR for only 6 months (May-October). A survey was conducted in 1996 in 5 villages in Pithoragarh District of the buffer zone, where Bhotiya cultivate medicinal plants on their agriculture fields. The aim of the survey was to understand the socioeconomics of medicinal plant cultivation and evaluate the future prospects of this practice in promoting sustainable development among the local community. Of a total of 71 families, 90% cultivated medicinal plants on 78% of the total reported cultivated area (15.29 ha). At the time of the survey, a total of 12 species of medicinal plants were under cultivation, of which 6 were being marketed while the remaining 6 were still under nursery plantation for future propagation. On average, a family earns about Rs.2423 ± 376.95 per season from the sale of medicinal plants (Rs.38 = US$1 in 1996). Based on the average productivity (kg/ha/y), we estimated that an average family could earn between Rs.4362 and Rs.86,500 from the sale of medicinal herbs. Encouragement of medicinal plant cultivation at high altitudes in the Himalayas would help to generate better monetary returns as well as conserve these herbs in the wild and preserve traditional ethnomedicinal knowledge among local people.