Local Governance models about community participation in Buenos Aires province, Argentina

CRAIG ELENA; SCARSELLETTA ANALÍA; MINAVERRY, CLARA; POCARESSI, MACARENA

Washington

Congreso; Second World Forum on Urban Forests; 2023

FAO-ONU

Urban forests, as an essential component of urban green infrastructure, offer ecosystem services that impact on life´s quality of population and also relate with a dynamic environment which is in constant transformation making these systems particularly vulnerable. According to Law No. 12.276/99 regulated by Decree No. 2.386/03, in the province of Buenos Aires, public trees are made up of all tree and shrub species installed in urban and rural areas for public use. Legally, municipal governments are in charge of planning and managing the urban forest plan. However, in practice, there are other social actors who make decisions that directly impact urban trees. Locally, there are no studies that reveal the level of intervention of the different social actors and of the perceptions of the ecosystem services offered by urban forest. In this paper, our purpose is to describe the experience of planning and implementation of a community survey. This tool has the objective to identify the actors that participate in urban forests, recognize the existing link between the community and forests, and explore the community´s perceptions about ecosystem services provided by urban forests. Also, it is important to know if people have the intention to participate in decision making processes. Actually, we are working with two municipalities of Buenos Aires province which are located nearby National University of Luján. One of them is the city of Luján, which belongs to the metropolitan area of Buenos Aires City, and the other one is Mercedes, the first bonaerense city, where both are advanced in the data collection activity. The survey was planned to be implemented with statistical people and the questions were agreed with municipal agents who work in this area. In the most advanced cities of this process, with approximately one hundred thousand inhabitants each, we have reached a representative sample size of n= 383; z: confidence level (z=95%); e: margin of error (e=5%); p: estimated percentage of the sample (p=50%). The preliminary results allow us to learn about the sociocultural history of the trees of the cities, recognize heritage trees, perceive the degree of knowledge of the community about the species of those cities and about the valid legal framework. In this sense, the results obtained revealed the importance of cultural ecosystem services such as the redefinition of public spaces due to the history of their trees, and the importance of certain forest public parks for physical, spiritual and cultural activities. They can be used as information towards the design of participative strategies and course of action to decision making, of public policies and of enactment of legislation. It is a proposal tool that could redefine a democratic system process with an active participation of the population in urban forest governance mechanisms to achieve healthy, inclusive and resilient cities.