Research Proposal Abstract

"Potential impacts of climate change on the Biodiversity in the marine and coastal Southern Caribbean Costa Rica"

Lilliana María Piedra Castro.

The marine and coastal ecosystems are systems that are important biological, social, economic and scientific. They are highly productive areas that are affected directly or indirectly by human activities. Existing information is focused on the richness and abundance of species in the ecosystem, but the relationship between environmental variables and the conservation status of ecosystems is much less explored. Identification of pressures in these ecosystems is necessary to propose measures for management and conservation of these. Therefore, it is proposed this research project, which aims to analyze the variations of environmental indicators in coastal and marine ecosystems in two protected areas for the development of conservation strategies, using four specific objectives, namely, 1) Determine trends spatiotemporal major environmental indicators in the area between the shoreline and the continental shelf in the South Caribbean of Costa Rica, 2) Set the state of conservation of major ecosystems of coral reefs, sea grass beds and mangrove Southern Caribbean Costa Rica, 3) Distinguish possible biophysical spatiotemporal variations on the beach in two protected areas in the South Caribbean of Costa Rica. 4) Identify the environmental pressure to propose protected areas conservation and management strategies by integrating information from the environmental variables and the conservation status of major ecosystems. Protected areas of focus in the research are the Cahuita National Park and the Refuge Gandoca National Manzanillo, Conservation Area Caribbean La Amistad National System of Conservation Areas of the Ministry of Environment and Energy. The proposed methodology for objective 1 is to use environmental variables and analysis of spatial data from the images of supported Rapid Word eyes and View 2. Objective 2 poses using AGRRA method for seagrass and reefs and mangroves for the method proposed by Komiyama (2005). Goal 3 is based in Martinez (2009) incorporating vegetation variables as contribution of this research. And the objective 4 presents the use of spatial models ArGGis with the information obtained from the above objectives. As products are offered four thematic maps on environmental variables analyzed, 3 maps on the conservation status of ecosystems, two interim reports and one final report.