Internal Ecosystem Restoration: a way to take responsibility for the previous environmental damage

Resumen

This paper presents a project for getting better the environment of the University of Santiago of Chile by means of changes which taking place within its campus, but impacting out of it. The main goal is artificially to recreate functions that were once performed and that they would have remained if the university had not existed. Since the university does exist, several natural structures do not exist within the campus and therefore some ecological functions performed by those structures accidentally neither exist. In this context of Social Responsibility, the project proposes the arrangement of waterbodies, the introduction of native trees, the construction of birdhouses and other modifications inside the campus for: thermal regulation, hunt of harmful rodents and capture of CO₂ among other impacts in the region where the university is located. This pioneering project not only can be replicated in other universities in the world; but also in other companies and organizations where the existence of them has been depriving the environment of various benefits.