- Panama's Parita Bay is a biodiversity hotspot and a key component of the region's hydrological cycle. However, in recent years its ecosystems have faced growing pressure from land-based pollution.
- An IDB project, backed by the GEF and part of the Clean and Healthy Ocean Integrated Program (CHO-IP), is helping Panama's Ministry of Environment to address these challenges through policy action, infrastructure investments, and nature-based solutions.
Parita Bay, located on Panama’s Pacific coast, is rich in biodiversity and plays a critical role in the region’s hydrological cycle. Its mangroves, swamps, lagoons, and rivers store water, regulate flows, buffer floods, and filter pollutants, helping maintain coastal water quality and sustain the life that depends on it. For surrounding communities, these ecosystems are more than just a landscape: they support fishing, agriculture, water security and local economies.
However, in recent years, Parita Bay’s ecosystems have been increasingly impacted by the accumulation of nutrients and sediments resulting from human activities. Agricultural intensification, overuse of fertilizers, inadequate soil management, and unregulated land-use expansion have increased runoff of nitrogen, phosphorus, and organic matter into coastal waters. This disrupts the delicate balance between water, oxygen, and nutrients, threatening fish, shrimp, migratory birds, and other organisms. For coastal communities, a degraded bay translates into fewer productive opportunities and greater economic, social, and environmental vulnerability.
To address these challenges, the IDB, as an implementing agency of the Global Environment Facility (GEF), supported Panama’s Ministry of Environment in the design of the grant project “Reducing Coastal Pollution in Parita Bay,” with a budget of $2.9 million.
The initiative is part of the Clean and Healthy Ocean Integrated Program (CHO-IP), which aims to tackle hypoxic marine zones by reducing coastal pollution through regulatory and policy measures, infrastructure investments, and nature-based solutions. The project in Panama, aligned with CHO-IP, is designed with a source-to-sea approach.
The project was developed jointly with multiple public institutions, including those focused on environment, agriculture, and territorial development, and it incorporates input from more than 80 key stakeholders — including academics, community-based organizations (CBOs), farmers of various scales, NGOs, and others.
The project is structured around four core components:
- Evidence-based awareness: Establish water quality monitoring systems and promote scientific research to inform public policy decisions and citizen engagement.
- Public policy for land-use planning: Support will be provided for territorial planning efforts that ensure horizontal and vertical policy coherence, using criteria such as ecological zoning, agrological capacity, and water governance, backed by interinstitutional coordination mechanisms.
- Nature-positive practices: Implement a pilot initiative with small-scale farmers, supported by a technical assistance program to improve soil management practices and reduce surface-water pollution.
- Cross-cutting knowledge management and learning: Promote collaboration and knowledge exchange among stakeholders and with CHO-IP. The goal is to generate valuable experiences from Parita Bay, where community engagement, nature, and science come together to address global challenges through local action.
Together, these actions aim to restore 43 hectares of wetlands, improve the management of 3,318 hectares of surrounding landscapes, and reduce the risk of hypoxia across approximately 7,700 hectares of marine habitat. An estimated 11,000 people — half of them women — are expected to benefit from the project’s outcomes.
Through this innovative project, the IDB continues to promote solutions that deliver tangible benefits for communities and territories. While its implementation presents challenges, it also offers valuable opportunities for learning through collaboration between government institutions and local communities in support of nature.