Lake Chapala team starting into week 2
It has been a week since we had our kick-off with AIPROMADES and we did good progress since then. Our team is honored to pilot a cooperation with Peace Corps and have Cara Pratt joining the project team on their behalf.
Last Tuesday AIPROMADES took us on a tour to the lake to see the weed as well as the surrounding areas. This was very valuable to the team as it is much easier to understand what we are talking about if we could live experience it. The main problem is the water hyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes) which is spreading fast and negatively impacting the ecological balance of the sea. When not controlled,it will cover lakes entirely; this dramatically impacts water flow, blocks sunlight from reaching native aquatic plants, and reduces oxygen in the water which causes significant reduction of fish. Also, the plants increase mosquito population. There is also water lettuce (Pistia stratoites) in the lake and it would typically show up between water hyacinth but to a way less big extend and not having that big impact on the ecological balance.
Our team is supposed to find alternative uses for the weed that are socially and economically sustainable.
On Wednesday we were working from the hotel as the AIPROMADES office was closed due to “La Romería”, a local religious holiday. The main discussions we had that day were around the assessment criteria that we want to use for different uses and drafting a research template that we would apply to illustrate the various use options. Also we did a very high level research on potential uses and splitted the found alternatives between the team for further research on required process steps to produce the alternate output, entry barriers and potential constraints, tools and resources ($ & human capital) required to implement, SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threads) analysis, etc.
Thursday we were back to the office in Chapala and intensively researched each of the options. Also, Cara took us through some recent statistics that showed CO2 emissions by municipality and root causes. This may be helpful later on once we start working out recommendations as we may want to show how these are impacting the emission levels. Mexico has also signed the Paris agreement and is thus required to bring its emissions down.
On Friday, Gabriel our host organization leader traveled to Florida to do his driving license for the newly ordered harvesting machine. Many other AIPROMADES team members went on an excursion to Lake Zapótlan that day and we thus decided to stay in the hotel again to conclude our research and consolidate the findings. We figured out the following potential uses: Biogas, Biodiesel, Animal Food, Fertilizer/Compost, Fibre boards, Cement, Medicine/Pharmacy, Bedding for lab mice, Charcoal briquetting, handicrafts and female personal products. We ended the week by preparing for a project progress review with Gabriel on Monday.
The weekend was reserved for team activities and on Saturday we went to Chapala and felt a little proud that we were able to tell a lot about the lake, the weed, the municipalities around the lake and the various focus areas by region (indigenous communities, expat communities, tourism, agriculture).
Week 2 began with very exciting news: finally the harvesting machine arrived last Saturday and Gabriel successfully completed his driving license and is very proud to be the first in Latin America having this certificate. Congratulations!
We then took Gabriel through our findings in the first week, re-assured we are on track and re-confirmed scope and assumptions we were making. Also, we worked with him to complete a stakeholder matrix which would
list all stakeholder of AIPROMADES
show their influence on AIPROMADES (low/medium/high)
illustrate their support level for AIPROMADES (resistant/watching/supporting/driving)
We are planning to repeat this exercise with other team members to see if there is a different perception and then also will interview some of the stakeholders to get their view on AIPROMADES and the activities around the lake and of course their view of the weed.
We spent the rest of the day working to put the various options in a simple chart, created a stakeholder interview guide and did research on international companies that may be interested in future partnerships. Also, we are benefiting from our translator Ana who started researching on local organizations/communities that may be able to support (financially, human capital, etc).
We ended the day with a late lunch in the wonderful garden of AIPROMADES. We decided to order food this time to not loose time to walk to a restaurant as the next ones take an approximate 20 minutes walk (though the restaurants are also definitely very nice there).
