Third Time's a Charm: Protecting Sonora's Sierra Huérfana
Imagine a typical summer in the desert plains of Sonora, Mexico. Temperatures soar above 110°F and seemingly monotonous, dry expanses of sand and dirt are speckled with thorny bushes. As you travel east across this arid landscape, you notice a mountain protruding from the middle of this desert scenery. Climbing up its slopes, you discover that there are canyons filled with water and an assortment of tropical vegetation like palms and ferns. Upon reaching the mountain’s highest point, the fresh air and scent of encino oak trees strikes your nostrils. Less than an hour ago you never would have imagined this paradise was just a stone’s throw away from the major city of Hermosillo.
The Sierra Huérfana is located just 70 miles from Sonora’s capital of Hermosillo in Mexico.
Nearly three decades have passed since inhabitants of northern Mexico’s Pueblo de Álamos and Rancho Viejo were first approached about the possibility of declaring their land as a protected area. Their response has always been cautious but clear: They want to protect their mountains. Today the community is attempting to rescue the Sierra Huérfana for a third time. It’s been a long journey with many setbacks and they’re warier than the first time, but still willing to believe in the power of conservation.
The Sierra Huérfana is one of the southernmost Sky Islands—the isolated mountain ranges north of the Sierra Madre Occidental—and serves as a link between the Hermosillo plains and the mountain communities. It’s also a biological connector between the low deciduous forests of southern Sonora and the oak and pine forests of the state's northernmost region. But not only is it an island of great biodiversity and strategic value as a biological corridor, it is also part of the cultural identity of the communities that inhabit it. It is an element of great importance for communities' economies and a source of pride.
In the early 1990s, the Ecological Center of Sonora (ECS) and its sister institution the Institute of Natural History of Chiapas were promoting state systems of Protected Areas in a simultaneous and avant-garde way. In Sonora, the now-defunct agency called Natural Protected Areas System of the State of Sonora (SANPES) had already identified and focused all efforts on the declaration of at least eleven Protected Areas in the state, some on the federal level and others on the state level. These included the Sierra del Pinacate, Sierra de Álamos and Sierra de Mazatán (or Huérfana) among others.
During the first six years of that decade, three federal acts were signed: the Biosphere Reserves of the Upper Gulf of California and Colorado River Delta, El Pinacate and Gran Desierto de Altar, as well as Sierra de Álamos-Río Cuchujaqui Flora and Fauna Protection Area. On the state level, the Abelardo L. Rodríguez-El Molinito Dam System was declared a Natural Protected Area.
It is important to mention that during the years that SANPES was active, technical personnel and staff from the environmental education and communication areas of the ECS visited the communities located within the proposed new protected areas to convince them to join this new stage of natural heritage conservation.
Although SANPES had positively impacted conservation within the state, and was recognized nationally as an example to follow for protected areas, the structure of SANPES was not as strong as it should have been. Following administration changes, the proposed framework for strengthening environmental issues in Sonora collapsed, and the Sierra Huérfana —as well as the other seven proposals for new protected areas —were discarded.
Fast forward to 2008: Mexico’s National Commission of Natural Protected Areas (CONANP) was formed as a decentralized body of the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources (SEMARNAT) and the federal government returned to the Sierra Huérfana region. They named the area a Priority Region for Conservation (PRC) with a long-term plan to protect the landscape as a Natural Protected Area.
That same year, CONANP hired El Colegio de Sonora a prestigious institution with ample experience working in the rural communities of the region, to conduct a new study to assess the viability of the Sierra Huérfana to become a federally-declared Protected Area for Flora and Fauna. The task of convincing the locals was not easy. The social and political conditions had changed, and the people who had actively participated in the consultation processes of the 90s were no longer there or remotely remembered the issue. There were new players, so the process had to start again from the beginning.
During this time period, CONANP embarked on a new stage of work with the communities. They implemented subsidies to promote and finance alternatives to economic activities that harmed the environment. In addition, they negotiated with local authorities to obtain their consent to once again declare the region a protected area, but now as a federally protected area.
Carlos Castillo with Pueblo de Álamos community leaders between 2019-2021
It was during this period that SEMARNAT published a Notice of Declaration, presenting studies that justified the creation of a Natural Protected Area in the region known as the Sierra Huérfana, and made them available to the public. But, just a few days after the notice was published, the political party that had governed Mexico for more than 70 years switched, changing not only the rules of the game, but priority focus areas, including the environmental sector. Then, in 2015, the head of CONANP changed and a new Commissioner was appointed. These changes, like all changes in the government, put all active processes on hold and under review. Consequently, all PRCs were eliminated from the subsidy programs (including the Sierra Huérfana), once again distancing the possibility of having a new natural protected area in Mexico.
Seven years have passed since CONANP halted this declaration, yet Wildlands Network continues to analyze Sonoran territory in search of conservation opportunities to reconnect wildlife through functional biological corridors. We have approached CONANP with several proposals to resume the processes of creating new natural protected areas, among them the pending declaration of Sierra Huérfana.
In a new approach, Wildlands Network has joined with authorities of both Pueblo de Álamos and Rancho Viejo to meet with landowners who are interested in continuing the process that would culminate with declaring their land as a Natural Protected Area. Although there was initially some hesitancy from the community in light of the events of recent years, with the support of Wildlands Network the process has resumed; their desire to protect their land and the natural resources has been reinvigorated.
Together with severe budget cuts to the environmental sector and CONANP in 2020 and 2021, and the economic and social crisis generated by the COVID-19 pandemic, there are even more challenges to establish the Sierra Huérfana as a Natural Protected Area. Although the outlook for 2022 is still uncertain, a new hope is emerging. During the second half of 2021, the Pueblo de Álamos community agreed to resume the process and requested the support of Wildlands Network to declare their land as a Voluntary Conservation Area. After waiting 30 years, this community may finally be able to protect their land.
