Biophysical description of Coapa river Basin, Chiapas

Abstract

The Coapa River watershed is located in the coast of the state of Chiapas, it begins at the top of the Sierra Madre, and ends on a coastal lagoon, the Carretas-Pereyra System. The lagoon receives sediments product of erosive processes within the basin up-lands, these processes include agricultural activities and other land use changes. This paper presents the biophysical description of the river basin, combined with the descrption of productive activities (including agricultural processes) which impact biophysical parameters as soil, water and vegetation, as part of the necessary assessment to achieve a sustainable explotation of the natural resources. In order to generate much needed biophysical information of the area (1:25,000), since 1998, at the Universidad Autonoma Metropolitana we conducted the project Manejo Integral de Cuencas and in this paper we present the results of it.