The project will bring together climate, hydrological and ecological data from protected areas and conservation organizations to strengthen research, conservation and climate change adaptation in mountain territories.
In 2026-2027, the Southern Andes Natural Laboratory (LNADS) will lead the project "Integrating information for monitoring mountain ecosystems in the Southern Andes", awarded through the GEO Mountains Small Grants Programme. The project will bring together environmental data from different mountain territories in southern Chile, strengthening the observation and monitoring capacities needed for the conservation, climate change adaptation and sustainable management of these ecosystems.
A large amount of climate, hydrological and ecological data on the mountain ecosystems of southern Chile has been generated by researchers, protected areas and conservation organizations. However, much of it is scattered across different systems, making it difficult to integrate and use to understand the environmental changes these territories are undergoing.
To address this challenge, the LNADS project seeks to develop a first working version of a long-term monitoring system for the Southern Andes, integrating data from Villarrica National Park, Bosque Pehuén Nature Reserve and Nasampulli Reserve, three territories with a well-established track record in research and environmental monitoring.
The initiative includes gathering and organizing existing information, standardizing metadata according to international criteria, harmonizing databases and developing geospatial visualization tools to improve access to and use of available information on mountain ecosystems.
Patricio Contreras, Executive Coordinator of the Southern Andes Natural Laboratory, highlighted that one of the project's main contributions will be building a collaborative network among the stakeholders currently monitoring these territories.
"This project is very important for the Southern Andes Natural Laboratory because it creates the first collaborative climate, hydrological and socio-ecological monitoring network in the Southern Andes of Chile, linking a public protected area, Villarrica National Park, with two private protected areas: Bosque Pehuén Nature Reserve and Nasampulli Reserve," he said.
Contreras added: "The data currently held in these monitoring systems will be made public in the Southern Andes Atlas, so that researchers, managers, communities and other interested stakeholders can access and visualize information about these ecosystems."
The initiative will be carried out in collaboration with Fundación Mar Adentro, Fundación FORECOS and CONAF, which will help connect and integrate the data. It will also be supported by CONDESAN, which will facilitate links with international mountain observation networks such as GLORIA-Andes and ROSA, broadening the project's reach. The work will involve undergraduate and graduate students from universities in southern Chile, helping train specialized professionals and build new capacities in environmental monitoring.
The project's main outputs will include a systematic inventory of monitoring infrastructure and data, metadata standardized to international criteria, geospatial dashboards with integrated information and a governance model that will allow the system to expand to new territories in the future.
Beyond integrating data, the project aims to lay the groundwork for coordinated, long-term observation of southern Chile's mountain ecosystems. The results will strengthen tools such as the Southern Andes Atlas and support the development of indicators to understand the condition and evolution of these territories, generating strategic information for research, biodiversity conservation and adaptation to the effects of climate change.
