Because it was so inaccessible, the area remained one of the most biodiverse<\/a> on the planet, with thousands of endemic plant species and hundreds of birds and amphibians. But in recent decades, much of that biodiversity has been lost. The region, known as the Choc\u00f3<\/a>, has experienced historic deforestation, with only around 3% of its lower-elevation forest \u2014 below 900 meters (3,000 feet) \u2014 still remaining<\/a>.<\/p>\n In one area of the Choc\u00f3<\/a>, in Esmeraldas province, the rise in deforestation coincided with the arrival of timber companies like Endesa-Botrosa, which built some of the first roads while logging the forest. Even when the companies reduced their work in the area a few years ago, deforestation continued to pose a major threat \u2014 largely because the companies left behind roads that people want to extend, conservation groups in the area say.<\/p>\n Today, many of the roads that used to take hours to navigate are relatively clean and patched up, allowing people from other parts of the country to move in. Communities are expanding the road network as their populations grow, clearing the forest to make room for cacao farming and cattle ranching. The area now has dozens of communities, each with a few hundred people. In some cases, the communities are only a few kilometers apart.<\/p>\n \u201cPeople take advantage of the trails that are left over from Botrosa, a remnant of the work it did,\u201d Efra\u00edn Cepeda, land manager at the Jocotoco Conservation Foundation, told Mongabay. \u201cThen people use those same roads to clear again.\u201d<\/p>\n Roads are often overlooked as a driver of deforestation, Cepeda said. But they usually serve as the \u201cfirst cut\u201d into an ecosystem before widespread deforestation takes hold, a study<\/a> in the journal Communications Earth & Environment found. Deforestation also tends to occur near roads and can accelerate land-use change.<\/p>\n With this in mind, the Jocotoco Conservation Foundation<\/a> has focused on purchasing land from private owners for conservation in the Choc\u00f3, often right before a new road is about to cut through it. The parcels it buys are added to the Canand\u00e9 Reserve, an approximately 19,000-hectare (47,000-acre) private protected area.<\/p>\n The process isn\u2019t always smooth, though. Some residents refuse to sell, and community leaders argue that they\u2019ll only survive with better connectivity. Others want to cut through the forest, not realizing that it\u2019s protected.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m not against development,\u201d said Jocotoco CEO Martin Schaefer. \u201cThe roads will be paved over in 20 or 30 years \u2014 that\u2019s fine. What I would like to safeguard is that [by that time], there will still be some tracts of forests of our reserve standing.\u201d<\/p>\n Cut, cash and run<\/p>\n Endesa S.A. and Botrosa S.A. produced plywood and wood products in Ecuador from the 1990s until 2021. Then Botrosa ceased operations, and Endesa continued to work there on its own. The companies have held certifications<\/a> to harvest numerous<\/a> trees species, including Calophyllum brasiliense, Brosimum utile and Gmelina arborea.<\/p>\n Harvesting the wood required clearing main roads into the Choc\u00f3, then building smaller offshoots to reach deeper parts of the forest. The work created jobs for locals and new arrivals, who operated the machinery and helped transport the wood. But workers also needed a place to live and stores to shop at. Endesa-Botrosa helped develop the area with education, road maintenance and nutrition programs, locals told Mongabay.<\/p>\n The companies\u2019 presence in the area, and the many roads that resulted, helped create local economies throughout the rainforest, observers said.<\/p>\n \u201cWith the road, everything was easier,\u201d said Alcides Zambrano, head park ranger of the Canand\u00e9 Reserve, who has lived in the area for more than 30 years. \u201cPeople started opening small markets and businesses for buying cacao, and everything started to change.\u201d<\/p>\n At the same time, Endesa-Botrosa maintained strict control over the area, according to multiple reports<\/a>. Company representatives sometimes used violence to obtain land and silence dissent about environmental damage, external evaluations suggest.<\/p>\n A 2005 Forest Stewardship Council evaluation<\/a> of the company said that it was taking a \u201ccut, cash and run\u201d approach to harvesting timber, in which it would clear entire sections of forest without regard for tree life cycles that allow for natural regeneration. It also cited numerous roads that had been built without environmental impact studies, and timber shipments that had been moved without the proper permits.<\/p>\n In 2021, Endesa-Botrosa was also tied to a sustainable-logging controversy<\/a> involving Home Depot. The U.S. retailer was allegedly sourcing plywood logged by Endesa-Botrosa in the Choc\u00f3 without a sustainability plan.<\/p>\n At the time of the controversy, an Endesa-Botrosa spokesperson told Mongabay<\/a> the company was dedicated to sustainable logging. For this story, it also maintains that the accusations of violence and social pressure are unsubstantiated, and that none of the complaints resulted in legal repercussions against the company.<\/p>\n \u201cThey weren\u2019t real and were simply malicious and ill-intentioned,\u201d Endesa sales manager Sebastian Guarderas told Mongabay.<\/p>\n Guarderas also denied that it was Endesa-Botrosa that first opened up the Choc\u00f3 to outside pressure, saying that most communities were already present when the company arrived, thanks to the advancing agricultural frontier.<\/p>\n In 2024, Endesa stopped logging the forest, opting instead to harvest exclusively on plantations. Critics say this change was driven by the depletion of accessible timber, forcing workers to travel farther into increasingly remote areas, which made logging uneconomical.<\/p>\n \u201cThe wood they had to extract was farther and farther away,\u201d Cespedes said. \u201cBefore, in a day, one truck could make two trips. After a while, in one day, a truck could make only one trip. So their operating costs were also rising a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n When the company made the switch, social responsibility programs remained but local employment dropped and other support for communities, including infrastructure maintenance, started to wane, locals said. The company argued that it was the government\u2019s responsibility to maintain schools, water systems and other local infrastructure.<\/p>\n With the company\u2019s presence diminished, what remained were former logging communities and a network of roads \u2014 and more rainforest for the taking.<\/p>\n Many residents near the Canand\u00e9 Reserve have learned that, when it comes to basic infrastructure and community development, they\u2019re largely on their own. Endesa has stopped maintaining many of the roads, and the government is virtually absent. Local offices are hours away by car, and officials in Quito, the capital, are nearly a full day\u2019s drive away. Several residents told Mongabay that visits from government representatives are rare.<\/p>\n Most growth in the communities comes from the hard work of residents, who harvest wood to build homes and stores, and rely on cattle ranching and cacao cultivation for income. Some food and medicine arrive on transport trucks, but residents said they largely fend for themselves.<\/p>\n \u201cAfter they win the votes, they forget us like always,\u201d said Marcos Tapullo, an Indigenous Chachi leader from Chontaduro, a village of approximately 250 people. \u201cThat\u2019s typical of politicians. We don\u2019t have support from any level of government, neither national nor local. We\u2019re just survivors.\u201d<\/p>\n Tapullo oversees Chontaduro\u2019s road committee, responsible for maintaining and expanding the roads. Without help from the government or Endesa, the committee relies on mingas, or community workdays, to make progress. At the mingas, everyone brings food to share while widening old logging trails and laying gravel.<\/p>\n Residents are also asked to contribute funds for construction materials. Those who don\u2019t pay are sometimes barred from using the road, in some cases by withholding a copy of the key to a gate.<\/p>\n \u201cNo car or motorcycle could get through, not even a donkey could pass,\u201d Tapullo said of the quality of the roads around Chontaduro, \u201cso we saw the need to organize ourselves.\u201d<\/p>\n The current roads give residents better access to the capital and thus a wider range of buyers for their beef and cacao. In medical emergencies, such as a woman going into labor, they no longer have to travel four hours by boat to the nearest facility, residents told Mongabay.<\/p>\n But roads don\u2019t create access in just one direction. They also allow outsiders to enter the area. In recent years, Ecuador\u2019s security crisis \u2014 marked by gang violence<\/a>, drug trafficking<\/a> and illegal mining<\/a> \u2014 has led some residents to worry about whether the violence will reach their remote part of the country.<\/p>\n \u201cBefore we had a road, we didn\u2019t have any problems,\u201d Mar\u00eda Brisita de la Cruz, founder of the Pueblo Nuevo community, told Mongabay. \u201cNow there\u2019s a road, and we have problems. Sicarios come in, thieves \u2014 because of the road. Anyone who wants to can come on a motorcycle or on foot.\u201d<\/p>\n Many of the outsiders come to log, Brisita de la Cruz said. Because there\u2019s no environmental oversight, they\u2019ve left little quality timber for everyone else. More people have begun building their houses with concrete, she said, because wood is rarely available.<\/p>\n Private landowners have most of the good timber these days. Every seven years, loggers for hire clear the properties so the wood can be sold.<\/p>\n Maximiliano Rivera, a logger, told Mongabay that logging on plantations is the main economic activity in the area, and that it likely won\u2019t go away anytime soon.<\/p>\n \u201cOf course [there will be more work in the future],\u201d Rivera said. \u201cThere are people who are dedicated specifically to reforesting this type of wood species.\u201d<\/p>\n A ring of defense<\/p>\n The Jocotoco Conservation Foundation began purchasing plots of land for conservation in the 2000s, when logging by Endesa-Botrosa was well established. In 2000, it founded the Canand\u00e9 Reserve, at the time measuring only 440 hectares (1,087 acres).<\/p>\n Over the next two decades, the foundation continued acquiring forest a few plots at a time, expanding the reserve to more than 19,000 hectares today to improve connectivity between Pambilar Wildlife Refuge, Cotacachi\u2013Cayapas National Park, and other protected areas. Together, the foundation says, these areas can serve as a \u201cring of defense\u201d for the Choc\u00f3.<\/p>\n Since its founding, the foundation has witnessed the recovery of endemic magnolia species like Magnolia canandeana and Magnolia dixonii. Its camera traps also identified 11 jaguars (Panthera onca), along with great curassows (Crax rubra) and 143 brown-headed spider monkeys (Ateles fusciceps) \u2014 more than half of the total global population of this endangered species.<\/p>\n Purchasing land for the reserve requires some strategy. Jocotoco members analyze satellite mapping data but also maintain strong relationships with communities, where discussions about expansion are always going on. Ideally, the foundation targets plots that fill \u201cgaps\u201d in the reserve or are adjacent to existing protected areas, helping create one large, contiguous forest corridor rather than a network of patches with development in between.<\/p>\n Cepeda and his colleagues spend a lot of their time driving around the area, making calls about land sales and meeting with property owners to negotiate prices. In urgent cases, the foundation will even offer an advance to a property owner if it means speeding up the purchasing process and stopping someone from clearing a new road.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s possible to lose the money, of course,\u201d Cepeda said, of one property it purchased with an advance. \u201cBut we had to do it because otherwise, one way or another, we were going to lose that forest.\u201d<\/p>\n In another case, satellite imagery revealed a road opened by Endesa-Botrosa years before. At first, the foundation was excited to buy it for the reserve because of its strategic location next to other protected forests, making it a perfect biological corridor. But after visiting the area on foot, they discovered the forest was too fragmented. Some of it was intact but other parts had been cleared for cacao.<\/p>\n They purchased it anyway, but for a separate forest regeneration project.<\/p>\n Survival vs. conservation <\/p>\n Many residents near the Canand\u00e9 Reserve said they agree with the Jocotoco foundation\u2019s conservation goals and respect the forest that it\u2019s protecting. In some areas, there\u2019s a clear line where private property ends and protected areas begin, making it easy to avoid any confusion.<\/p>\n But not everyone is so understanding. Tensions sometimes arise between the foundation and communities, who want to expand roads for better access to their properties.<\/p>\n A map of the reserve shows exactly where the friction lies. Just east of Chontaduro, one road continues straight before suddenly veering north around a section of forest owned by the foundation. Farther south, two roads branch out from Sim\u00f3n Platatorres but can\u2019t continue \u2014 they\u2019re blocked by the reserve.<\/p>\n \u201cWe bought these properties because the route of the road had already been laid out,\u201d Cepeda explained. Many of the roads reaching dead ends would eventually connect if the reserve wasn\u2019t there, he added.<\/p>\n Last September, landowners approached Cepeda and asked if it would be possible to extend a trail through part of the reserve. They argued that one small road wouldn\u2019t do much damage and could allow them to travel to other communities with their crops. Cepeda said he would consult his colleagues, already knowing the answer was no.<\/p>\n \u201cOpening a road there, for us, is a huge problem,\u201d he said, \u201cbecause it allows people to get in for hunting, to go in and take out wood, and it\u2019s a headache.\u201d<\/p>\n Communities have also asked the foundation to contribute thousands of dollars to road construction, arguing its members use the roads as much as anyone else. This put the foundation in a difficult position, Cepeda said. Clearing the land is against their mission as an organization, but it\u2019s also important to maintain a good relationship with locals.<\/p>\n In the end, they opted not to contribute to the road construction, albeit while paying a different kind of price. Several roads around the reserve are now blocked by gates, and some locals refuse to let members of the foundation through.<\/p>\n \u201cObviously, we\u2019ve been buying properties in several places to prevent new roads from being opened,\u201d Cepeda said, \u201cand it would be quite contradictory for us to be supporting a road.\u201d<\/p>\n Despite these challenges, Cepeda and other members of the foundation are optimistic about the work they\u2019ve done, and say it will ultimately achieve long-term protection for the area.<\/p>\n To bolster that work, the foundation set up the first scientific lab<\/a> in the Choc\u00f3 lowlands, with space for research labs and plant nurseries. The hope is not just to save the rainforest but also to understand its recovery and biodiversity.<\/p>\n \u201cConservation organizations such as Jocotoco need to ensure that some of the most irreplaceable regions in the world still have a chance of surviving,\u201d said Schaefer, the foundation\u2019s CEO. \u201cWe can save some very important chunks of forest. We can secure the buffer zones of national parks to increase their chances of protecting large ecosystems.\u201d<\/p>\n Banner image: A road through the Choc\u00f3. Image by Efra\u00edn Cepeda<\/p>\n Citations:<\/p>\n P\u00e9rez-Escobar,\u00a0O.\u00a0A., Lucas,\u00a0E., Jaramillo,\u00a0C., Monro,\u00a0A., Morris,\u00a0S.\u00a0K., Bogar\u00edn,\u00a0D., \u2026 Antonelli,\u00a0A. (2019). The origin and diversification of the hyperdiverse flora in the Choc\u00f3 biogeographic region.\u00a0Frontiers in Plant Science,\u00a010. doi:10.3389\/fpls.2019.01328<\/a><\/p>\n Myers,\u00a0N., Mittermeier,\u00a0R.\u00a0A., Mittermeier,\u00a0C.\u00a0G., Da Fonseca,\u00a0G.\u00a0A., & Kent,\u00a0J. (2000). Biodiversity hotspots for conservation priorities.\u00a0Nature,\u00a0403(6772), 853-858. doi:10.1038\/35002501<\/a><\/p>\n Zheng,\u00a0X., Chen,\u00a0J., Zou,\u00a0Z., Zhen,\u00a0S., Liu,\u00a0S., Li,\u00a0J., \u2026 Hu,\u00a0X. (2025). Sprawling roads enhanced tropical forest loss during the period 2001-2020.\u00a0Communications Earth & Environment,\u00a06(1). doi:10.1038\/s43247-025-02158-8<\/a><\/p>\n See related from this reporter:<\/p>\n Ecuador axes environment ministry as officials scramble to revive economy<\/a><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/2026_002_AA_RioCanandeReserve_v3_Regular-scaled.jpg\")
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A road through the Choc\u00f3. Image by Maxwell Radwin<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/IMG_2854-768x512.jpg\")
A road through the Choc\u00f3. Image by Maxwell Radwin
\n\u2018We\u2019re survivors\u2019 <\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/IMG_2805-768x512.jpg\")
Timber stacked up on a plantation outside of the Canand\u00e9 Reserve, Ecuador. Image by Maxwell Radwin<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/IMG_2709-768x512.jpg\")
A member of Jocotoco inspects a gate erected by a local community. Image by Maxwell Radwin<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/2026_002_AA_RioCanandeReserve_v3_Close-up-scaled.jpg\")
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