The present research is part of a wider qualitative study that aims to assist cities in the South Pacific developing countries with the recovery of natural areas through a green infrastructure-based approach, following a case study method. The overarching purpose of this study is to pinpoint relevant contributing elements for the successful implementation of the green infrastructure approach aiming at providing Peruvian coastal cities with novel sustainable environmental policies. To foster the conservation of the natural or semi-natural ecosystems converging with the cities, the following specific objectives were set: 1) to carry out a comprehensive physical and spatial analysis of the natural areas of Chimbote and Nuevo Chimbote; 2) to review the Peruvian regulatory framework, at the national and municipal levels, as well as international standards on the conservation of natural areas; and 3) to explore a scenario featuring the disappearance of these Peruvian coastal natural spaces and its associated consequences.
TopIntroduction
It is well known that Green Infrastructure is a natural life support system that interconnects cross-scale natural and semi-natural areas (Allen, 2012) while providing a wide array of ecosystem services. Moreover, it is considered to be a strategic tool for addressing current global environmental challenges such as climate change, which have been attracting the attention of many researchers (Caparrós et al., 2021). The substantial interest generated by Green Infrastructure emphasises the value of nature’s benefits to human society and the need to mobilise investments to sustain and reinforce them (“Green Infrastructure (GI)”, 2013; “The Multifunctionality of Green Infrastructure”, 2012).
It is noteworthy that some European countries such as, inter alia, Spain, Germany, England, and the Netherlands, have been taking this issue increasingly seriously since 2013. These heighten the need for implementing comprehensive development policies in line with those established in the European Commission’s White Paper and investing in Green Infrastructure-based urban planning models (“Green Infrastructure (GI)”, 2013) where it plays a key and central role towards smart habitat conservation for the 21st century (Benedict & McMahon, 2002) rather than merely assuming a beneficial scenic or recreational value for human physical and mental health. Thus, the singling out of Green Infrastructure initiatives as a European investment priority comes as no surprise (“Green Infrastructure (GI)”, 2013).
Europe offers an encouraging outlook on this issue based on the implementation of strategic green space networks across several cities such as Manchester in England (“A Green and Blue Infrastructure Strategy for Manchester”, 2015) and Vitoria-Gasteiz in Spain (“The Urban Green Infrastructure of Vitoria-Gasteiz”, 2014). Specifically, Vitoria-Gasteiz’s urban green belt is a set of periurban parks of high ecological and landscape value arising from an ambitious restoration and recovering project of the city’s outlying areas, with an environmental and social focus. This sustainable urban policy allowed for the recovery of the Salburua wetland park, which was subsequently recognised as a Wetland of International Importance by the Ramsar Convention in 2002.
A vast array of wetlands can be found across the globe, as is the case with Peru’s coastal desert regions. As illustrated in Fig.1, this area exhibits protected wetlands, e.g. the Paracas National Reserve, the Manglares de Tumbes National Sanctuary, the Pantanos de Villa Wildlife Refuge, the Lagunas de Mejía National Sanctuary and the Pacaya Samiria National Reserve off the coast (“The Ramsar Convention on Wetlands”, 1971), in addition to other wetlands which are yet to be covered by governmental protection. Yet, a worrying statistic reveals Latin America as the leading world nation in loss of wetlands, with urban growth as one of the main culprits (Rojas et al., 2020). In fact, previous research has shown that there is a significant correlation between residential development and wetland loss (Halls & Magolan, 2019).
Figure 1. Map of Peru displaying the Ramsar sites, the natural, artificial, and coastal river-mouths wetlands
The current climatic, political, social, and economic conditions of the South Pacific coast vastly differ from European ones. The former is still home to developing countries such as Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Chile, all of which are particularly vulnerable to climate change. Yet, the shared geography and climate features of Peru and Chile make them unique: their location in a desert strip characterised by extreme temperatures combining lacking vegetation and overpopulation is conducive to urban grey infrastructure growth at exponential and uncontrollable rate.