Identification of priority areas for the ecological restoration and reference sites in the South Region of Ecuador

Abstract

In the Southern Region of Ecuador (RSE), which includes the provinces of Loja, El Oro and Zamora Chinchipe, the degradation of natural heritage generates the need to recover using ecological restoration (RE) strategies, for which it is necessary to identify the priority zones to restore, as well as the reference areas. In this context, the present investigation focuses on identifying, through the multicriteria evaluation, the priority areas that need to be restored, and by remote sensing the reference areas for the identified zones. Thus, through the supervised classification of satellite images, the incorporation of the ER experts criteria through paired comparison matrices and through the Analytical Hierarchical Process (PAJ) in a Geographical Information Systems (SIG) environment, priority areas for restoration or for reference, respectively, were defined. For the priority areas, five environmental criteria were considered, four socioeconomic and four intrinsic, and for the reference areas two vegetation cover and land use criteria, four related to the National System of Protected Areas (SNAP) and four socioeconomic. The results indicate that about 10% of the RSE was classified into the maximum priority to restore. The area with potential for reference is 2.73% of the local area. Finally, it was determined that the priority areas were distributed throughout the RSE, but it represents a continuous in the provinces of El Oro and Loja. The quality reference sites coincide with areas of the SNAP, having a greater representation in the province of Zamora Chinchipe.