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IMPACT PROMISE
Our Partners are carefully selected due to their high conservation impact
Partner Snapshot
Partner Name
Location:
Sierra de las Minas Biosphere Reserve
Actions:
- Hiring and training of rangers and forest firefighters to protect Guatemala’s largest continuous patch of cloud forest.
- Providing uniforms, tools, and transportation to ensure safe, efficient work.
- Forest protection actions to reduce wildfire risks and illegal activities while protecting critical areas and biodiversity.
Appeal Category:
- Capacity Building and Training
- Protected Area Management
- Wildlife Conservation
Key Species:
- Baird’s tapir (Tapirus bairdii)
- Horned guan (Oreophasis derbianus)
- Jaguar (Panthera onca)
- Golden-cheeked warbler (Setophaga chrysoparia)
Challenges And Threats:
- Forest firefighters face high-risk situations combating wildfires affecting over 500 hectares annually.
- Adequate resources to address this emergency are not prioritized by government entities.
The Challenge
Each year, wildfires burn more than 1,200 acres in the Sierra de las Minas Biosphere Reserve, a vast mountain range in eastern Guatemala that protects the country’s largest remaining cloud forest. These fires destroy critical biodiversity and natural ecosystems while degrading air quality and threatening water availability for over 200 communities in the region.
Forest firefighters are essential to both suppressing active fires and preventing future ones through community monitoring, raising awareness, and training local farmers in safer agricultural burning practices. Yet they work with insufficient resources and face life-threatening conditions during increasingly severe fire seasons driven by climate change. Without adequate support, these frontline defenders cannot effectively protect one of Guatemala’s most vital conservation areas.
Urgent Solutions
Defensores de la Naturaleza partners with local communities to combat wildfires in the Sierra de las Minas Biosphere Reserve. This year, Porta Hotel Antigua joins these efforts, creating a cross-sector alliance to prevent and respond to the wildfire crisis.
Why Your Donation Matters
The Sierra de las Minas Biosphere Reserve protects Guatemala’s largest continuous cloud forest and endangered species like the Baird’s tapir, Jaguar, and Horned guan, while regulating water supplies for hundreds of thousands of people and capturing carbon that fights climate change. Guatemala is among the countries most vulnerable to climate change, and wildfires are accelerating environmental destruction. When the Sierra de las Minas forest burns, communities lose clean water and livelihoods, wildlife loses habitat, and we all lose a critical climate ally. Your support protects this treasure when it’s needed most.
Your donation funds the hiring, training, and equipping of community-based forest firefighters who serve as the frontline defense for this irreplaceable ecosystem. It provides the uniforms, tools, and transportation needed to work safely across thousands of acres of remote cloud forest. Trained teams suppress active fires, monitor vulnerable areas, educate communities about fire prevention, and restore burned landscapes.