Integrating ecological and cultural histories to inform sustainable and equitable futures for the Colombian páramos

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Our inter-disciplinary project addresses the first challenge of the Colombian Bio Resources call by examining: (1) the socio-ecological system of páramo habitat in Boyacá and Cundinamarca; (2) the value of biodiversity in this system to local communities and wider society; and (3) the response of páramo ecosystems to environmental change and anthropogenic pressures including social and political change. Through investigating the current and potential value of biodiversity and ecosystem services provided by páramos, both in monetary and non-monetary terms, the project will promote the economy of páramos in the Departments of Boyacá and Cundinamarca, thereby contributing to economic development and social welfare in Colombia. We will integrate ecosystem-based and historical conceptions of human-nature interactions to reveal how socio-economic, political and cultural changes have interacted with environmental pressures in shaping páramo ecosystems over time, and use this new understanding to inform future sustainable and equitable governance options. In this way we will address the programme's challenge of "functioning and resilience of socio-economic systems" by bringing together researchers from natural sciences and humanities.The history of high-elevation páramo habitat is fundamental in understanding the pressures this ecosystem now faces. For the Muisca people and for many páramo inhabitants today, páramos are sacred places from where the gods came that controlled water and the origin and maintenance of life. To European colonists, páramos were seen as the source of abundant mineral riches based around the legend of El Dorado. More recently, the critical importance of páramos in providing fresh water to the growing urban populations of Colombia and supporting unique biodiversity have come to the fore, along with the recognition that the system faces significant challenges from climate change and land-use pressures. These competing pressures are placing increasingly diverse demands on the system, and, despite a number of initiatives both nationally and internationally, tensions over the management and governance of the system persist. The páramo socio-ecological system is therefore ideal for addressing the challenges of the Colombia Bio Resources programme. Our project will show how an integrated environmental-historical understanding of páramo ecosystem patterns, processes and pressures can provide insights to new governance solutions. We will take a 500-year historical perspective to analyse changes in the socio-ecological system of páramos over time, focusing on the central role of human-nature interactions and how these have changed in response to differing social, political and cultural contexts. We will quantify how páramo habitat has changed, from decades to centuries. We will consider how these changes have impacted on ecosystem dynamics, and predict what further changes are likely to occur in the future under climate and other drivers of change. We will explore how human-nature relationships in páramo landscapes have changed and compare the perspectives of local communities with other private and state actors. We will identify the potential for páramo communities to obtain monetary values from páramos and the ecosystem services they provide, examining the synergies and trade-offs between different ecosystem services. Our research will provide a unique historical context for the development of future governance options, including new partnerships between different stakeholders underpinned by greater social and cultural understanding. The project will deliver recommendations for mechanisms to promote more sustainable and equitable futures for páramo landscapes, in the context of key political and social challenges such as post-conflict displacement, illegal mining, changing climate and increasing water demand from urbanization.