Israeli Experts Called Upon To Help Preserve Galapagos Islands

Isolated tropical islands are the dream of every tourist, adventure-seeker and nature lover, but they are also rare “natural laboratories,” where the special ecological conditions and extreme isolation create unique and stunningly beautiful biological diversity. Indeed, it was his visits to such island archipelagos that prompted Charles Darwin to formulate some of the central principles of his Theory of Evolution.

A delegation from Ben Gurion University in Israel, led by Professor Ariel Novoplansky, has toured the Galapagos Islands – an archipelago of volcanic islands distributed on either side of the Equator in the Pacific Ocean – and signed a cooperation agreement with the local Directorate of the National Park to promote the conservation of the endangered biological diversity of the islands.

Although the Galapagos biodiversity is neither greater nor more unique than that of other archipelagos, such as the Hawaiian or the Canary Islands, what makes these islands unique is their recent history.

Galapagos

Contrary to other islands across the world the Galapagos were only settled for the first time about 100 years ago, so their ecosystem has sustained considerably little damage.

However, in spite of over 50 years of dedicated management and conservation of the area and its surrounding waters by the authorities of the Galapagos National Park,  conservation policies need urgent change.

“In spite of excellent management and meticulous policing of ecotourism, a full-blown ecological disaster is unfolding before our eyes, inflicted by the devastating effects of invasive species,” says Novoplansky of Ben Gurion University’s Jacob Blaustein Institute for Desert Research (BIDR).

Fending off the eco-invasion

A Sally Lightfoot crab found in the Galapagos Islands

Rising demand is pushing for ever-increasing development of the local tourism industry, which encourages greater imports of various goods, food and fresh agriculture produce from the mainland. Without any external intervention, labor and production costs on the islands are much higher than on the mainland, dictating the abandonment of most of the island’s farms and the transition of most of the islands’ workforce to the tourism industry, according to Novoplansky.

These processes expose the unique and sensitive biodiversity of the islands to the extremely destructive effects of invasive species such as feral domestic animals, aggressive weedy plants, various insect pests and alien marine organisms.

Novoplansky explains that increasing numbers of such organisms arrive to the islands through the delivery routes from the mainland and multiply with great vigor in both natural ecosystems and abandoned farms, harming the local fauna and flora and changing entire ecosystems existing nowhere else in the world.

Israeli Experts Travel To Galapagos Islands To Help Preserve Ecosystem

Upon the invitation of the Ecuadorian Ministry of Environment and the Directorate of the Galapagos National Park, a delegation from the Center of International Conventions of the Blaustein Institutes for Desert Research visited the Galapagos for work meetings and field excursions with managers, rangers, policy-makers, farmers and conservation experts.

The visit ended with the signing of a cooperation agreement to find the best ways to minimize the detrimental effects of invasive species to the biodiversity, natural habitats and agricultural areas of the archipelago. The project will be conducted by joint Ecuadorian-Israeli teams, pursuing novel nature management schemes that will help rehabilitate natural ecosystems by developing agricultural methodologies and water technologies to increase local agricultural production and reduce the dependency of the islands on the imports of fresh produce from the mainland.

Using agriculture to preserve the ecosystem

Competing for the same natural resources, agriculture and nature conservation are usually considered competing and antagonistic forces, but not so in the Galapagos. “The current project is based on a new premise, whereby agricultural developmental is not necessarily used as a powerful toolbox for increasing food production, fighting poverty and improving standard of living. In fragile places like the Galapagos, sensible conservation strategies may take advantage of carefully-crafted agricultural practices to combat and prevent the destructive effects of invasive species to unique ecosystems and endangered biodiversity, the fate of which we are all so anxious about,” says Novoplansky.

The Ecuadorian ambassador to Israel will be visiting the BIDR at the beginning of May in the context of this collaboration.

In addition to Novoplansky, the delegation included Professor Uriel Safriel, who heads the Center of International Conventions at BIDR, Doctor Alon Ben-Gal, a desert agriculture expert from the Volcani Center of the Israeli Ministry of Agriculture, Professor Aliza Fleischer, an agricultural economist from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Professor Noam Weisbrod of the Zuckerberg Institute for Water Research, BIDR. Novoplansky is a member of the Mitrani Department of Desert Ecology, Swiss Institute for Dryland Environmental and Energy Research, BIDR.

Photos by ippei + janine and jenny ayala