History
Since the 1990s (e.g., Armesto 1990, 1994), researchers in Chile have made calls for the formalization of a long-term ecological research agenda. Today, based on funding from the Basal Financing Program (CONICYT) and the Millennium Scientific Initiative (MIDEPLAN), the Institute of Ecology and Biodiversity is in a position to consolidate a research agenda that extends over broad spatial and time scales. In this context, the emerging Chilean Long-Term Socio-Ecological Research (LTSER) Network was launched in June 2008 at a meeting with scientists and authorities in the Cape Horn Biosphere Reserve as part of the international workshop “Confronting global change with a network of long-term socio-ecological research sites in the south of the Americas.”
Working with partners and associated satellite sites, this initiative can uniquely address the entire latitudinal range of temperate forest ecosystems in southern South America, and in addition to accumulating high quality, continuous environmental data, this program provides infrastructure to conduct international and interdisciplinary research and field courses. It is also expected that the permanent insertion of research and academics into local and regional contexts will facilitate the link between science and society, including decision making, the implementation of two biosphere reserves, and biocultural conservation strategies.
In its first phase (2008-2011), the Chilean LTSER network will consolidate ongoing research, training and outreach efforts between Fray Jorge Experimental Site (30°S), Senda Darwin Biological Station (42°S) and the Omora Ethnobotanical Park (55°S) and apply for recognition by the International Long-Term Ecological Research (ILTER) Network. In a second phase (2011-2013), two new field sites in the Andes and Atacama Desert will also be included and a formal process of external site selection will be initiated to expand the program into a national and inter-institutional strategy to coordinate LTSER programs.
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