Venezuela’s New-Found Species Already in Danger

CARACAS – A trio of new species – a fish, a frog and a plant – that were recently discovered in northern Venezuela are already in danger of extinction because the expansion of human activity is diminishing the water supply in their habitat.

The three species were identified in January by a team of researchers who traveled to the high valleys of the Carabobo Basin to study biodiversity after reports of widespread loss of forest in the region.

“We can say that possible new species were found,” biologist Arnaldo Ferrer, coordinator of the research team, told EFE.

“They are already endangered, if the level of (human) intervention in the area continues, they are in danger,” he said of the new species, which were found at an altitude of 1,300 meters (4,260 feet).

Scientists became alarmed when they noted the degree of deforestation, Ferrer said, warning that if illegal logging and land clearance continues, the forests will disappear within five years.

The devastation spreads even though the 276,000-hectare (681,500-acre) expanse is supposed to be a “protected area” under a 1978 executive order citing the Carabobo Basin’s importance as the main source of water for more than a million people.

“About 80 percent of the forest cover is disappearing, it could be some 50,000 hectares, and this has an impact on climate, an impact on overall environmental quality and on the production of water,” Andres Osorio, president of the Venezuelan-German Institute for Applied Environmental Sciences, told EFE.

The group received a $50,000 grant from the UN Development Program for efforts to restore the Carabobo Basin.

The good news is that roughly 30,000 hectares of the devastated forest areas can be restored.

“We must secure the source that replenishes the aquifers and the source that replenishes the aquifers is the forest,” Osorio said.