Project
Photo: Anna Laurie Miller / AIDAConserving the Ciénaga Grande de Santa Marta
Ciénaga Grande de Santa Marta, the largest and most productive coastal wetland in Colombia, covers 45,000 hectares. At the confluence of the Magdalena River and the Caribbean Sea, the site boasts an immense variety of flora and fauna, including mammals, birds and fish. Its southern tip is a beautiful sanctuary of mangroves, swamp and amphibious forest.
On the calm waters of the marsh stand the Ciénaga’s famous stilt villages, supported by pillars or simple wooden stakes and inhabited by local fishermen since 1800. In a place accessible only by water, many of the things we take for granted—being served a glass of water, quick access to a doctor—are considered luxuries. Residents depend on the natural world around them. Sadly, in recent years mass fish die-offs caused by the marsh’s degradation have threatened the livelihoods of 2,500 people who call the Ciénaga Grande home.
Illegal activities are destroying this vital ecosystem: intentionally set forest fires, deforestation of large tracks of land for agriculture and livestock, logging and burning of mangroves, and 27 kilometers of illegally built dikes.
This destruction not only devastates the local fishery; it also has global impact. Ciénaga Grande’s mangroves absorb large quantities of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, aiding in the global fight against climate change.
The importance of the Ciénaga Grande has been recognized both nationally – the Sanctuary of Flora and Fauna Ciénaga Grande de Santa Marta is a national park – and internationally: UNESCO’s Man and the Biosphere program declared the lagoon a biosphere reserve; and the Ciénaga Grande is listed as a Wetland of International Importance under the Ramsar Convention, an intergovernmental treaty for the protection of wetlands.
AIDA and our partners are advocating for the Colombian government to fulfill its national and international obligations to protect the Ciénaga Grande. After all, millions of animals, the local community, and our global climate depend on it.
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Legal ways to protect the environment in Colombia
By Héctor Herrera, AIDA legal advisor and coordinator of the Colombian Environmental Justice Network, @RJAColombia Our activities make an impact on biodiversity and the environment every day. The trouble is that our impact is getting increasingly harsher such as with climate change and the extinction of species like the Colombian Grebe (Podicepsandinus, in Spanish). In Colombia, in response to the above situation, the law has been improved to help protect the environment. The Colombian Constitution, for example, recognizes the importance of protecting the environment and the right to a healthy environment in Article 79, while national environmental laws and in other legal instruments offer more help. The following are some of the most important legal proceedings in Colombia designed to achieve and protect the right to a healthy environment. Action of "tutela" This legal remedy was created with the 1991 Constitution to provide immediate protection for fundamental rights such as the right to life. To protect the right to a healthy environment, the Constitutional Court of Colombia ruled in Sentence T-1527 in 2000: “While the right to a healthy environment is not considered a fundamental right in our constitution, it is a collective right that can be protected by popular actions. It can be protected through the exceptional mechanism of the action of tutela when actions or omissions by public authorities or private individuals threaten or violate fundamental rights, such as to life, health, physical integrity, or if it affects the public right to a healthy environment. It is thus a fundamental right by connection."[1] Compared to other legal proceedings, the action of tutela is simpler and swifter in its procedures. Popular Action This action is enshrined in Article 88 of the Colombian Constitution. It provides protections for collective interests and rights associated with public health and the environment. Article 88 was further developed in Law 472 of 1998, whose Article 4 contains a non-exhaustive list of collective rights and interests that can be protected by this legal proceeding. These include the enjoyment of a healthy environment, the existence of ecologic balance and access to public services. The goal of this popular action is to eliminate hazards, threats or violations to collective rights, and restore things to their previous state when possible. This action is preventive, restorative and compensational in nature. An emblematic case involving popular action was taken by the Corporación para el Desarrollo Sostenible del Archipiélago de San Andrés, Providencia y Santa Catalina (CORALINA) before the Dispute Tribunal of San Andrés, Providencia and Santa Catalina. CORALINA demanded protection for the right to a healthy environment, the existence of ecological balance, and the rational management and use of natural resources as well as the protection and attention to regional species and ecosystems to permit a sustainable development of the community and the environment. The tribunal ruled in favor of CORALINA in a sentence that can be consulted here (in Spansih). Group Action This action is contained in Article 88 of the Colombian Constitution and should be considered in combination with Article 79, which stipulates the right to a healthy environment. Unlike popular action, which seeks to prevent damage to a public right, group action seeks economic compensation for damages caused to a group of people with homogeneous characteristics with respect to the activity that caused the damage. A symbolic case was the group action taken by peasants and fishermen affected by an oil spill on the Trans-Andean pipeline, which is operated by Colombia’s state oil company Ecopetrol, in 2000 on the Rosario river in Nariño, a southeastern department on border with Ecuador. The oil spill caused serious environmental damage. For a detailed explanation and better understanding of this subject, you can consult the legal sources for the aforementioned proceedings. These include the Political Constitution, Law 472 of 1998, and the jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court (in Spanish). [1] Sentence T-1527 of 2000 MP Alfredo Beltrán Sierra.
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Scientists call for investigation of Gulf of California coastal development
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In their letter to the CCA, the scientists write that they are "concerned that the rapid expansion of massive tourism infrastructure threatens the integrity of important sites for biodiversity in Mexico."They also note that they are alarmed by projects receiving approval despite disturbing trends such as environmental impact assessments that overlook scientific information or even use erroneous data.The letter is available here. Using the best available information during the impact assessments of proposed projects is required by Mexican law. The failure to do so is just one of the problems documented in the citizen petition that NRDC and our partners joined in April 2013. The petition highpghts four cases where projects received approvals despite environmental reviews that failed to comply with existing laws and regulations.The groups who submitted the petition – now joined by the 27 scientists – want the CEC to initiate a thorough investigation into the situation and develop a factual record on the lack of enforcement of environmental protections during the approval process of four projects: Entre Mares and Paraíso del Mar, both planned on the Bay of La Paz which is considered some of the most productive waters of the Gulf of California and is a key site for nesting birds. Playa Espíritu that would impact the Marismas Nacionales reserve, the most extensive and well-preserved mangrove forest on the western coast of Mexico. Cabo Cortés, which was proposed just north of and adjacent to Cabo Pulmo National Park which shelters one of the most important coral reefs in the American Pacific and is recognized as a both a UNESCO World Heritage Site and Ramsar Wetland of International Importance. In the case of Cabo Cortés, for example, key authorizations were granted even though the environmental impact statement was woefully insufficient and reasoned that the project would not affect the park because the local water currents only flowed from south to north. This conclusion was based on pmited data and ignored years of scientific articles proving that the currents in the area in fact flowed in multiple directions, varying with the seasons. The recent scientists’ letter is not the first time that international experts weigh in on the risk that mega-resort style projects represent for Cabo Pulmo National Park and other similarly fragile regions of the Gulf of California. In November 2011, a joint mission from Ramsar, UNESCO and IUCN visited the parkto assess the potential impact of the Cabo Cortés proposal. Their final report noted that the evaluation of the project did not take into consideration all the indirect and cumulative impacts of the project and that given its scale and scope the project represented a threat under Ramsar Convention guidelines. Similarly, in September 2012, theIUCN’s World Conservation Congress issued a resolution urging Mexico to guarantee the protection of Cabo Pulmo, including from risky large-scale tourism and real-estate developments. The same resolution also called on Mexico to ensure that environmental laws are strictly appped when it comes to projects that could have a direct or indirect impact on the health of surrounding ecosystems. A chance to do the thing right in the future The Cabo Cortés proposal that threatened the ecosystem and local community of Cabo Pulmo was fortunately eventually halted by former President Feppe Calderón in June 2012. But two short months after the cancellation was announceda very similar project was temporarily proposed on the same site, indicating that interest in developing the lands near the park had not disappeared. In the event that yet another project is proposed near Cabo Pulmo, or near other ecologically fragile areas of the Gulf, it will be critical for the Mexican regulators to do their job right and ensure that the environmental impact review upholds all laws and meets the highest technical and scientific standards. The CEC has an important job to do now. By developing and making pubpc a comprehensive factual record on the past failures to effectively implement Mexico’s environmental protections in the Gulf of Capfornia, it will help shed pght on how Mexico can strengthen its review process to prevent future high impact projects from harming some of the Gulf’s most iconic areas. Join the 27 scientists who have spoken up to protect Cabo Pulmo and other natural treasures in the Gulf of California bytaking action and asking the CEC to investigate the lack of enforcement of environmental laws. **The Commission on Environmental Cooperation is an international body established under the North American Free Trade Agreement to promote cooperation among Canada, Mexico and the U.S. on environmental issues of continental concern.
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New Hope for Environmental Justice in IFI Projects
In its budget bill for 2014, the US Congress has taken bold steps to promote environmental justice within international financial institutions. Among other measures, the bill instructs the US representatives in these institutions to oppose large dams and logging projects that affect primary tropical forests, and to seek justice for the victims of human rights violations in IFI projects such as the Chixoy Dam in Guatemala. With input from other groups, International Rivers and AIDA published a factsheet which summarizes the provisions of the budget bill and the opportunities it creates for NGOs. The factsheet is addressed at partner groups monitoring and campaigning against IFI projects.
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