Prodesis was a development project in the Lacandon region of Chiapas, Mexico, that ran from 2004 to 2008. The aim of the project was to reduce pressure on the rainforest and combat poverty among its inhabitants, most of them being Mayan Indians and subsistence peasants.
Plan and objectives
Prodesis is an abbreviation of the Spanish name for the programme: Proyecto de Desarrollo Social Integrado y Sostenible, Chiapas, Mexico (Integrated and Sustainable Social Development Project, Chiapas, Mexico).
Its overall objectives were: poverty reduction among the inhabitants of the Lacandon region reduction of the pressure on the natural resources and mitigation of environmental degradation reformulation of social development policies in Chiapas, with emphasis on participative and sustainable territorial development
These goals should stimulate a sense of citizenship, and enhance the relation between the Chiapas government and the 155,000 inhabitants of the 830 communities located around the protected area of the Lacandon Jungle: the Montes Azules Biosphere Reserve. This population, which is mainly indigenous and rural, has the highest levels of poverty and marginalization in the State of Chiapas, and of Mexico as a whole.
Prodesis was a continuation the Integral Programme for the Sustainable Development of the Selva Lacandon Forest (PIDSS), which in turn was a continuation of Plan Cañadas.
As re-formulated on start-up in 2003, Prodesis focussed on 16 of the 34 micro-regions identified by PIDSS. These "micro-regions" were defined by suitability for particular approaches to social and economic development and included Agua Azul, Avellanal, Amador Hernández, Betania, Benemerito de las Américas, Carmen Villaflores, Comunidad Lacandona, Damasco, Francisco I Madero, Maravilla Tenejapa, Marqués de Comillas, Nahá, Nuevo Francisco León, Nuevo Huixtán, Rio Blanco, and Santo Domingo.
Financing, organization, implementation and evaluation The project was a cooperation between the state of Chiapas and the European Union (EU), and was budgeted for €31,000,000, of which €16,000,000 was invested by the state of Chiapas. The EU contributed €15,000,000 through EuropeAid. The European project (or agreement) code is ALA/B7-310/2003/5756.
The history of PRODESIS stretches back to 1996 when a mission of four consultants visited Mexico and carried out an area appraisal to prepare a proposal for a Euro 5 million project to be carried out between SEMARNAP and the EC (Teyssier, Capietto and de Agostini, 1996). In late 1998 SEMARNAP responded to a set of key issues that had been raised by the EC Delegation in 1997, presented a reformulated proposal and requested that renewed consideration be given to the Project.
The 1996 proposal was appraised by a further mission, carried out in September 1999, made up of Dr. Alastair White (anthropologist and socioeconomist) and Torsten Mark Kowal (rural development forester and climate/environmental scientist), working for LTS Consultants, Scotland, UK. They reported on the ongoing feasibility of the Project as designed in 1996 through: (i) fact-finding to identify substantive changes in the socio-economic and political context; (ii) analysis of the logic and applicability of the original approach; (iii) appraisal of the probability of fulfilment of basic conditions, identified in 1996 as prerequisites for successful project implementation. The re-designed project was proposed to EU Aide Attaches in September 1999 and to EuropeAid in Brussels. The main points in the re-design were to require local project-orientated planning processes within all components to supersede the ambitious participatory planning component proposed in 1996; and emphasis was placed on defining options for achievable changes in land-use, for training specific groups in the alternative land use and microenterprises options, and for linking up community-level projects with credit and other funding sources.
From 2000 to 2003 the project then awaited improvements in the social and political context, as well as due process by the EC and the Mexican Government. The go-ahead for Prodesis was agreed in 2001. Preparations and consultations started in 2002, and the final contract was signed December 2003.
Following formal approval, given all the elapsed time, it was necessary to re-design the project yet again, and this was done by Dieter Paas and Arturo Arreola, once the project was tendered for European Technical Assistance in 2003. However, it is unclear how far the White/Kowal recommendations were accepted; nor is it evident how many of the changes proposed in 1999 to the 1996 proposal were then taken on board during the 2003 re-design once the project formally started up. No internet references exist that describe these inputs and their role.
The project started in 2004 and initially was expected to run until 2007, but due to delays related to modifications of the project plan and financial issues between the EU and Mexico, the project then continued for an extra year until September 2008.
Prodesis was carried out by SeDeSol (Secretariat of Social Development of the State of Chiapas), and its director was Rodolfo Diaz Sarvide. Christian Bouteille was the (European) head of the International Technical Assistance. The European Delegation in Mexico-City was responsible for the European involvement in the project.
Despite some progress and the benefits resulting from the Prodesis investment, in 2008 a classified evaluation report, ordered by the European Commission, and conducted by IBF International Consulting in collaboration with B.A.a Consultors (Piero Di Giacinto, Jan Karremans, Thomas Pijnenburg) concluded that Prodesis had not achieved all its objectives.
These strong criticisms were summarised by independent sources and can be read here or here . A further clear set of criticisms are summarised here that take Prodesis as a case study.
On 13 and 14 October 2008 the 8th meeting of the Joint Committee (established Under the EU-Mexico Economic Partnership) Political Coordination and Cooperation Agreement (Global Agreement) was held in Mexico City. Regarding the session on cooperation it was stated that: "Both parties took note of the progress achieved in current projects in the fields of social development, economic cooperation and science and technology. The parties furthermore underlined the positive results of PRODESIS implementation and agreed to explore the possibility of continuing it with a second phase in the 2007-2013 Cooperation Programme."
In early 2009 it was decided that Prodesis was not going to be continued with a second phase in the Cooperation Programme.
Historical background of European involvement
Prodesis was signed within the framework of the Free Trade Agreement and Association Agreement between the European Union and Mexico:
"The new agreement should lead to liberalization of trade and investment between Mexico and the EU [...but also to...] greater social equality and a political system that is genuinely democratic and pluralist and respects human rights. [...] This agreement opens the door to a wide range of potential cooperation activities between the parties, and will allow the EU to provide Mexico with financial and technical assistance for such social programmes as action against poverty, regional development, and cooperation in the field of human rights and protection of indigenous communities. [...] With regard to the current political context in Mexico, the discussions on the new agreement are going hand-in-hand in Mexico with a complex internal political process of democratization and reform. [...] The process of reform currently underway is also being hindered by a range of other factors such as [...] the conflict in Chiapas, the activities of guerilla movements in a number of other areas and the human rights situation, one of the most dramatic recent examples being the massacre which occurred in Acteal on 22 December 1997 and which was strongly condemned by Parliament in its resolution of 15 January 1998. [...] The 1997 agreements [...] include a democracy clause or human rights clause as an essential component. This was a stumbling block to the signing of the framework agreement in 1991. Nevertheless, the difficulties which have arisen in the context of the transition process in Mexico have highlighted the importance of the democracy clause. [...] Parliament therefore considered it vital that the democracy clause be included in the new agreement and that the applicability of the agreement would be conditional on strict respect for that clause."
Criticism of Prodesis On January 23, 2004, an article in the Mexican newspaper La Jornada reported that in the community of Nuevo San Rafael in the Lacandon forest, 23 houses were burned down and that the victims were chased into the jungle. February 3 Mexican news magazine Proceso suggested a link with a cooperation programme between Mexico and the EU. On several Indymedia-sites and other news and community sites around the world it was soon suggested that the violence was perpetrated by the Mexican Army against the Zapatista Ch'ol tribe, and that the EU was involved in relation to Plan Puebla Panamá. Before the project even got started Prodesis was already accused of being a counter-insurgency project aimed at getting rid of the local population to gain control over the regions' natural resources.
Based on this information Member of the European Parliament Erik Meijer posed a question (E-0546/04, 26-2-2004) to the European Commission (see below).
Since early 2004 numerous critical articles (varying in factuality) about Prodesis have been published in Mexican newspapers (mainly La Jornada), magazines (Proceso , Contralínea ), and on websites of local and international NGOs.
On 9 February 2007 58 representants of communities in the Lacandon region signed the Declaration of Moxviquil in which they demanded the project to be suspended. The most important reasons stated in the document were that they were not properly informed about the project, which is a violation of ILO convention 169 and the Mexican Constitution (art.2). Another reason was that they did not see any serious effort in real social development, only some subsidies for cement, tin roofs, chickens and crops. After they had offered the declaration to the director of Prodesis and the head of the European Delegation in Mexico-City, some of those who signed the declaration were threatened by Prodesis staff: if they would stand by their signature, they would not receive any kind of government support anymore (like opportunidades or procampo).
Historical background and previous development projects
Also please see more about the socio-political context in the Lacandon region, and the predecessor-projects of Prodesis, Chiapas conflict.
Until the 1950s, the Selva Lacandona covered an area of about 1.3 million hectares (13,000 km2). By the mid-1990s the pristine forest had been reduced to about 400,000 or at most 450,000 ha. The Lacandón Indians, who until the 1950s were the still the only inhabitants of the Selva Lacandona, were then only about 600 persons, having been reduced from much larger numbers by the diseases brought in the late nineteenth century to which they had no immunity, brought by the mahogany cutters who first penetrated the area. The Lacandones by late last century numbered about 800. Due to demographic pressure, since the late 1950s and especially in the 1970s, about 80,000 other Indians originating in the highlands of Chiapas have occupied parts of the forest area. They are mainly Tzeltals (56% of the present population), with some Tojolabales (17%), Chols (11%) and Tzotzils (2%).