Amigos de los Jaguares
The Problem
Cattle-ranch related deforestation of the South American Chaco is eliminating natural prey for jaguars, turning them toward cattle as a new food source. Consequently, ranchers often resort to killing jaguars to protect their livestock resources. This increases pressure on the jaguar population whose numbers are already declining due to habitat destruction throughout South America. Alternative management methods to prevent or mitigate cattle depredation by jaguars are needed so ranchers can protect their resources without harming the cats. While many human-carnivore management measures are used all over the world, there are no resources for ranchers to understand these methods, align funding for their implementation, report their effectiveness, or communally share their results. Without resources, support, or incentive to change behavior, many ranchers have no recourse or reason to stop killing jaguars. The Chaco’s conservation potential makes human-jaguar conflict management particularly significant. Despite encroaching deforestation, the Chaco retains expanses of forest capable of preserving jaguar populations. Although habitat destruction is the main threat to jaguar numbers, reducing conflict with ranchers will help preserve the population, help ranchers keep income, and reduce ranchers’ animosity towards jaguars, steering their behavior from destruction to tolerance, and eventually local conservation efforts to save the cats and maintain biodiversity.
Our Proposal
Amigos de Los Jaguares is a mobile application and website where ranchers will research, test, and report on cat-friendly methods to manage jaguar depredation on livestock. The platform targets small community and large corporate ranchers who operate on land which was formerly natural jaguar habitat. A group of participating ranchers will choose a global best-practice method to test on their ranch and provide feedback on its effectiveness through the app’s reporting metrics. This will create a shareable database of results that can be used by researchers, NGOs, and the ranching community. Additionally, ranchers will be encouraged to adapt global practices to suit their needs and will use the platform to share these functional adaptations with other ranchers. This will create locally-owned solutions that are far more likely to be realized and maintained by the ranchers long-term and foster collaboration in the ranching community. We are considering program incentives such as payment for participation, compensation for attacked cattle or pairing ranchers with funding sources. The platform will be launched with Paraguayan Chaco Jaguar Conservation Project (PCJC) whose experience solving human-jaguar conflict in the Chaco has developed close relationships with many Paraguayan ranchers. PCJC will initially provide support, training, and funding for ranchers to install or implement their chosen methodologies and expertise on which global methods are most likely to work locally.
We Assume that...
1. Cell network or internet is available 2. Ranchers will participate 3. Someone maintains the database and app/website 4. SPECIES, or another local organization, continues on-the-ground support
Constraints to Overcome
The project aims to create communication amongst the ranching community about which techniques are vs. are not working to reduce encounters between jaguars and cattle. To date, there is little if any organized communication amongst ranchers in this field, or between small scale and larger scale operators. The application will enable communication, data collection, as well as proactively email alerts to ranchers about new information that will help their business while preserving more jaguars. Ranching in the Chaco is a relatively new industry and to our knowledge, no organized efforts have tackled this problem. Other constraints - large foreign-owned ranches vs. local small-scale/subsistence farmers - differences in engagement, financial capital, and direct impact.
Current Work
0-6months -Develop app/website wireframe including --Resource hub/catalog of solutions --Jaguar-Cattle interaction Reporting tool --Available funding resources --Communication Form --Incentive program --Design the tool to capture Spillover/Negative externalities, and direct ranchers towards a (future) compensation fund. --Publication of metrics -Solicit SPECIES, the ranchers, and other experts to make sure the app addresses their needs and the reporting metrics are appropriate and effective. -Develop the app/website content and receive approval from SPECIES 6+ months -Hire a team of web developers to create a stand-alone app, test the app, and present it to SPECIES for final approval. -Implement the app/website within SPECIES. in both English and Spanish. -Launch initial prototype for user testing.
Current Needs
We currently have the basic web development, marketing, conservation, and business experience to execute these initial discovery tasks. We will need to work with SPECIES throughout the process to ensure alignment with their goals (reporting metrics, etc). We will need to work with some ranchers to ensure this solution meets their needs. We also want to engage subject matter experts to determine the content of the app and identify appropriate reporting metrics and strategies. We will need a conservation researcher to create a catalog of potential evidence-based solutions, and to locate the resources to reference once posted to the site. We may need to source Spanish translation services. We will likely need to source the final web development services, though this step will likely be outside the 6-month time-frame.