Juan David Gutiérrez is a man passionate about nature and with a great sense of appropriation for the environment. Throughout his life, Juan has lived in cities such as Medellín and Bogotá, he had the opportunity to mark a life path while at university and later work at some point in his life in the sales area. Later he decided to go to Europe, learn a little more about that idiosyncrasy, that way of seeing the world from another perspective and then go to India to live for more than five months in this place.

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The El Amparo Nature Reserve, which has belonged to Juan's family since 1991, has been a dedicated area in this region for reforestation and environmental aspects, something that was of interest to this family. His great bond with nature is due to his father, who remembers him a lot and, according to Juan David, describes him as a restless and curious man about the environment and points out that since they lived in Antioquia he instilled in Juan from a very young age the significance of it was reforestation, something that marked him and stayed with him for his whole life.

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After many trips and experiences Juan moved me in 1997 together with his wife to Puerto López, Meta, where the Nature Reserve is located, his conviction and conviction were the reasons for him to go and live in this place. They have been living in "El Amparo" for more than 23 years, characterizing himself as a man resonant with nature and with an immense openness to be in constant learning.

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Extensive cattle farming, the constant practices of burning in this area and other situations were aspects that exhausted Juan David, seeing how nature was deteriorating. Despite the great efforts to make fire barriers so that this did not enter the ecosystems, and in this way that it would not affect the morichales and the gallery forests, Juan made the decision to go one step further in formalizing the nature reserve, the which has been advanced throughout these years.

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He points out that he has found very interesting things, such as visitors who considered that the plains were uninhabited savannahs and that when these people entered the Shelter, they realized that the ecosystems had been repopulating and commented on the way in which they have been given care to ecosystems and biodiversity.

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Regarding the sighting, Juan David indicates that they have been able to carry out important records by seeing mammals, birds of many kinds, reptiles and a large amount of water, all thanks to the visits of experts who have carried out the survey of the base information in the Natural Reserve "El Amparo".

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Four years ago, Juan David decided to formalize the conservation of this area and care for biodiversity, led them to work on the survey of baselines with universities, biologists and professionals from the environmental field began to arrive, to develop all these advances that were significant for “El Amparo”.

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Juan David comments that he read a report that talked about the implementation of Habitat Banks in the country. He says that it caught his attention and even more so when he found out that environmental compensation was involved, an issue that is very important to him and he has always been very attentive, since it incorporated the fact of how companies can compensate, reach very good terms, but above all that it was an operation over 30 years old.

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For Juan David, “Stop being short-sighted and consider that this is much more time to start contributing more to the conservation of biodiversity”, is an accompaniment, as he has seen, through the existence of the Habitat Bank of the Meta. At that time, he chose to contact Mariana Sarmiento, CEO of Terrasos. With great memories, he comments that he had a meeting in the city of Bogotá, to understand this new compensation model and bet on her for the implementation of a new Habitat Bank in Colombia.

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It should be noted that next to "El Amparo" there are two other natural reserves, according to what Juan David points out, since they are relatively close to each other, they began to carry out more territorial and joint work, by covering more areas and This allowed them to start a very special work, an initiative that has taken a lot of strength such as El Triangulo del Puma, a biological corridor where this species and others transit, in which environmental research processes are conserved and carried out.

“Humanity in general terms has been getting a little closer to the possibility of that understanding, in which we are on a planet that if it is taken care of, it will have a better chance of existing and that natural resources cannot be taken until exhausted by a consumer productivity. Fortunately there is more awareness, we must continue working to make a quantum leap in which we stop looking at this not from the obligatory nature of a decree, but from the full conviction of conscience”, Juan David points out.

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Today, Juan David works hard so that compensation is not only a mandatory mechanism for companies, but it can also be a voluntary contribution from all of us who exist in this country and in the entire world and manage to return all that to nature. that he has given us until today to be able to live.

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In this 2022 Juan David through the Natural Reserve "El Amparo" and Terrasos, have formalized through registration with the Ministry of Environment and Sustainable Development, the linking of a new Habitat Bank in Colombia in the department of Meta, to provide solutions for compensation and conservation of biodiversity in the country.

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