{"code":"24729","sect":"El Salvador","sect_slug":"el-salvador","hits":"1090","link":"https:\/\/elfaro.net\/en\/202008\/el_salvador\/24729","link_edit":"","name":"A Landmark Environmental Treaty Gets Little Traction in El Salvador","slug":"a-landmark-environmental-treaty-gets-little-traction-in-el-salvador","info":"The Escaz\u00fa Agreement, a watershed 2018 United Nations environmental treaty for Latin America and the Caribbean, could mark a dramatic shift in environmental policy for Central America. Despite the deepening climate change-related degradation of the country\u2019s environment and violence against the environmentalists who come to its defense, though, the Bukele administration hasn\u2019t publicly expressed its intentions regarding the accord. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has until September 27th to sign the agreement.","mtag":"Politics","noun":{"html":"\u003Cspan class='tint-text--dark' data_href='\/user\/profile\/rgressier'\u003E Roman Gressier\u003C\/span\u003E","data":{"roman-gressier":{"sort":"rgressier","slug":"roman-gressier","path":"roman_gressier","name":"Roman Gressier","edge":"0","init":"0"}}},"view":"1090","pict":{"cms-image-000034240-jpg":{"feat":"1","sort":"34240","name":"cms-image-000034240.JPG","link":"https:\/\/elfaro.net\/images\/cms-image-000034240.JPG","path":"https:\/\/elfaro.net\/images\/cms-image-000034240.JPG","back":"","slug":"cms-image-000034240-jpg","text":"<p>The deteriorating mangroves in the Bosque Salado of Jiquilisco Bay, Usulut\u00e1n. Courtesy CESTA Amigos de la Tierra<\/p>","capt":"\u003Cp\u003EThe deteriorating mangroves in the Bosque Salado of Jiquilisco Bay, Usulut\u00e1n. Courtesy CESTA Amigos de la Tierra\u003C\/p\u003E"}},"pict_main__sort":34240,"date":{"live":"2020\/08\/14"},"data_post_dateLive_YY":"2020","data_post_dateLive_MM":"08","data_post_dateLive_DD":"14","text":"\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EAfter hours searching for the endangered blue crab throughout the Xirihualtique-Jiquilisco Biosphere Reserve in late spring of 2018, a joint team of environmentalists and officials from a local mayor\u2019s office ran into a child no older than ten. The boy approached the group along the banks of the Aguacayo River\u2014where photographers had begun to document the deterioration of the mangroves\u2014and delivered a concise and candid message: \u201cLeave.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EC\u00e9sar Artiga, an environmentalist who has spent more than a decade working with Salvadoran youth, responded gently to what he thought was the outburst of a troubled kid. \u201cHey, is something wrong, or are you here with someone?\u201d he remembers asking. \u201cNo, no, I just came to tell you to leave,\u201d the boy said. After the photographers took a few more pictures, a knot in Artiga\u2019s stomach told him it was time to head out. As the group climbed into the trucks and drove away, he says a group of muchachos\u2014teenagers even less welcoming than the boy\u2014emerged from the nearby rows of sugarcane.\u00a0\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EIt\u2019s unclear who authored the apparent threat; El Salvador\u2019s mangroves and arable lands are home to complex human ecosystems involving corporate agricultural developers, gangs, drug traffickers, local farmers, and their communities. Artiga interpreted the incident as hostile because of a longstanding pattern of unchecked aggressions toward Salvadoran environmentalists amid deepening environmental deterioration and the encroachment of global climate change in the region. A coalition of leading environmentalists is calling on the Salvadoran government to substantially upgrade the country\u2019s environmental protections by adopting the 2018 Escaz\u00fa Agreement, an ambitious international environmental treaty, before its September 26th opt-in deadline. Thus far, though, the Bukele administration has largely ignored or deflected invitations to publicly broach the treaty.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E \u003Cfigure class=\"pict pict_land pict_move_posc 0 cs_img cs_img--curr rule--ss_c\" data-shot=\"pict\" data-hint=\"pict\"\u003E \u003Cdiv class=\"pict__pobj text-overflow\"\u003E\u003Cimg src=https:\/\/elfaro.net\/get_img?ImageWidth=2592&ImageHeight=1944&ImageId=34240 class=\"pobj\" style=\"max-width: 100%\" rel=\"resizable\" alt=\"The deteriorating mangroves in the Bosque Salado of Jiquilisco Bay, Usulut\u00e1n. Courtesy CESTA Amigos de la Tierra\" \/\u003E\u003C\/div\u003E \u003Cfigcaption class=\"pict__text cs_img_caption folk_content typo_buttons line--ss_s0c line--ss_s0c--auto block full-width text-overflow rule--ss_l relative\"\u003E \u003Cdiv class=\"__content block-inline full-width align-top tint-text--idle relative\"\u003E The deteriorating mangroves in the Bosque Salado of Jiquilisco Bay, Usulut\u00e1n. Courtesy CESTA Amigos de la Tierra \u003C\/div\u003E \u003C\/figcaption\u003E \u003C\/figure\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003E\u201cThe chief stumbling block, we believe, is that there\u2019s no sense of commitment or understanding of the importance of civic participation,\u201d Artiga \u003Ca href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/UCAeconomia\/photos\/a.1680521785555161\/2577223075885023\"\u003Etold\u003C\/a\u003E the Universidad Centroamericana (UCA). Artiga heads the Escaz\u00fa Advocacy Team, a cooperative network of Salvadoran environmental organizations advocating for the country to sign and ratify the Escaz\u00fa Agreement, which 22 countries from Latin America and the Caribbean negotiated and finalized in conjunction with the United Nations in the Costa Rican canton of the same name in 2018.\u00a0\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003E\u201cWe\u2019re in critical condition regarding environmental degradation, the loss of biodiversity, the accelerated effects of climate change. We\u2019re seeing many extreme natural disasters affecting countries of the global south like El Salvador,\u201d he continued. Even so, Artiga and his team see the Escaz\u00fa Agreement not as a radical panacea for all of El Salvador\u2019s long-standing environmental struggles, but as a critical step along the path toward a more sustainable and environmentally just future.\u00a0\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003E\u201cWith Escaz\u00fa, we would make our existing institutional and public policy framework more robust. It would mean equipping our environmental institutions with better tools to carry out their work, and other countries and international actors wanting to invest could set criteria and say, \u2018We want to check on how El Salvador is implementing the Escaz\u00fa Agreement\u2019,\u201d he argued.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EA Region Besieged\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EEl Salvador is facing multiple systemic, overlapping\u2014and, in certain cases, underreported\u2014environmental crises: degradation of lands due to deforestation, proliferation of monocrop agriculture, and the adverse effects of climate change on both crops and wildlife; failure to investigate violence against environmentalists; and underinvestment in environmental protection. These crises reflect broader realities across Central America\u2014a region which has become one of the most dangerous places for environmentalists on Earth and which experts say will acutely experience mass disruptions from global climate change in the decades to come.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003E\u201cCentral America is one of the regions of the world most exposed to climate phenomenon, and its societies and ecosystems are particularly vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change,\u201d wrote the U.N. Economic Commission for Central America & the Caribbean in 2018. This July, the non-governmental organization Global Witness identified Central America as one of the most dangerous regions in the world for environmental and climate change activists, noting an emerging trend: in 2019, Honduras rose to become the most dangerous country per capita for land and environmental defenders. Nicaragua came in third, and Guatemala fourth.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EBut the Global Witness report, according to Artiga, has one major shortcoming: \u201cIt\u2019s extremely dangerous to be an environmental activist in El Salvador, despite the fact that Global Witness and the United Nations don\u2019t mention El Salvador in the list of murders and other grievances in the region.\u201d A major reason for the undercount of violence against Salvadoran environmentalists is the process by which their deaths become eligible for inclusion in the report: they have to be correctly identified as environment-related in credible investigations as well as appear in multiple national news accounts.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003E\u201cWhen we find a homicide, people\u2019s knee-jerk reaction here\u2014and I think the news media and the successive administrations have played a major part in this\u2014is to automatically ascribe it to the gangs,\u201d he argued. The Escaz\u00fa advocacy team is currently working to produce reliable estimates of violence against environmentalists in the country.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EGovernment regulators have registered 2,152 complaints of violations of the country\u2019s Environmental Law since 2016, according to the Environmental Complaint System maintained by the Ministry of the Environment and National Resources (MARN). The largest complaint categories are \u2018construction and activities in endangered areas,\u2019 with 15 percent, and \u2018deforestation,\u2019 with 12.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EIn response to an information request about the ministry\u2019s response to these complaints, MARN outlined regulations designed, in theory, to protect the environment. \u201cThe Environmental Law establishes environmental audits as the mechanism for ensuring the applicant\u2019s fulfillment of conditions outlined in the environmental permit,\u201d responded information officer Ethel Elizabeth Cabrera Tobar, in reference to provisions in the \u003Ca href=\"http:\/\/cidoc.marn.gob.sv\/documentos\/ley-del-medio-ambiente-2012\/\"\u003E2012 Environmental Law\u003C\/a\u003E, specifying that applications pass through an environmental impact evaluation and then through MARN\u2019s approval process.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EBut these regulations are designed to curb future abuse, not to offer redress for existing violations\u2014the kind that might result in an environmental complaint. In the same response, Cabrera Tobar cited sanctions outlined across multiple environmental conservation laws for perpetrators of certain environmental crimes, including the provision that perpetrators \u201cshall be obligated to restore the affected environment or ecosystem. In the case that such restoration is impossible, they shall pay damages to the state and affected parties for the harms caused.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EShortfalls of El Salvador\u2019s Current System\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EEl Salvador has two main environmental justice institutions tasked with reviewing MARN complaints and issuing protective orders for the environment, its human defenders, and other species: three environmental courts and an appellate chamber that, in theory, takes action when courts\u2019 environmental protection orders are violated without redress.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EBut these bodies are chronically underfunded, said Artiga, and the Attorney General\u2019s Office is currently not required to investigate whether persecution is related to environmental defense. As a result, when threatened environmentalists report their agroindustrial aggressors, the cases often drag on under a heavy caseload with limited resources to conduct investigations. Delays and non-investigation often result in death.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003E\u201cWe\u2019ve documented cases of people who have disappeared after opposing rural development megaprojects,\u201d said Artiga. \u201cIt\u2019s sad to recognize that such an important ecosystem to the country\u2014that is, the mangroves of the Bosque Salado\u2014have become clandestine graves for activists because we lack a mechanism to ensure that the state sees the urgency of protecting them.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EThe failure to reform the environmental laws and regulations on the books is partly the result of cozy alliances between agroindustrial lobbyists, the legislature, and the executive, according to Ricardo Navarro, director of CESTA Amigos de la Tierra, an organization of academics and environmentalists based in San Salvador whose work extends throughout the country. \u201cEconomic forces have been too strong, and have gone unchecked, and so we\u2019ve had problems. But now, even more so,\u201d Navarro told me, citing the administration\u2019s cuts to the budgets of MARN, the Ministry of Health, and the National Association of Aqueducts and Sewage.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EThe state\u2019s prioritization of elite economic interests, often to the detriment of the environment, is far from a new problem. It has deep historical roots in El Salvador\u2019s political economy.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EThe state has a longstanding precedent of turning over the country\u2019s most fertile lands to agroindustrial groups for the purpose of monocrop farming\u2014such as coffee, indigo, cocoa, cotton, and, most recently, sugarcane\u2014that fuels export revenue. Environmentalists and rural communities have had little place to turn when they face threats from agroindustry or criminal groups encroaching on their land. The state has not only been historically absent in protecting the environment; it has also been an accomplice in the despoilment.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003E\u201cWith the goal of bringing monocrop coffee farming to the country, they stripped away our communal lands by legislative decree,\u201d said Abel Bernal, resident and environmentalist whose ancestors have worked the land of Usulut\u00e1n for generations, in a \u003Ca href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=Fi9sEC840dQ&feature=youtu.be\"\u003Evideo\u003C\/a\u003E published by Movimiento Enlaces por la Sustentabilidad in January of 2017. \u201cWe\u2019ve inhabited this territory for more than 200 years, specifically in Usulut\u00e1n, where lands were allotted to ranchers, and the ranchers have been responsible for the plundering of our land and the environmental deterioration.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003E\u201cThen the cotton industry is born, followed by sugarcane. And of course, it\u2019s an observably rural phenomenon, in the sense that the state\u2019s policy is crafted with the function of using rural territory to meet the needs of the whole population,\u201d he continued. Rural and indigenous communities, like that of Bernal, are the targets of constant threats from agroindustrial companies looking to encroach onto their lands, according to both the Escaz\u00fa Advocacy Team and CESTA. The encroachment of sugarcane, in particular, has reduced the space for communities to grow corn, beans, squash, and other foods.\u00a0\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EThe dangers small farmers face from monocrop agriculture, though, go beyond political bullying and crop encroachment. Navarro and Artiga noted that crop-dusters spray growth hormones such as glyphosate on monocrop lands, leading to chronic kidney disease and cancer in local communities, as well as far-reaching contamination of El Salvador\u2019s water supply and aquatic ecosystems, including the coastal drainage system and mangroves of Jiquilisco.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003E\u201cSome people and NGOs, and even some public officials...are concerned about the environment. But there has been no backing at the political level,\u201d adds Navarro. He says that even the FMLN, the predominant left-wing opposition party which has historically allied itself with CESTA in advocating for legislation such as the \u003Ca href=\"https:\/\/www.asamblea.gob.sv\/decretos\/details\/3004\"\u003ELaw Prohibiting Metallic Mining\u003C\/a\u003E, has been slow to invest its political capital on environmental issues in recent years. \u201cThere have been deputies who have told me, \u2018I get the whole thing about the environment, but we should focus on more serious problems.\u2019\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003E\u003Cstrong\u003EEscaz\u00fa Advocates Look to Settle a \u201cHistoric Debt\u201d\u003C\/strong\u003E\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EA historic, multi-pronged legal framework developed by the United Nations for environmental protection, the Escaz\u00fa Agreement seeks to cement a relatively new concept\u2014that of environmental justice, or the right to a clean and sustainable world and protections for those fighting for such a world.\u00a0\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EThe agreement, which negotiators from 22 governments in Latin America and the Caribbean approved on March 4th, 2018 in the canton of Escaz\u00fa, Costa Rica, is the culmination of decades of frustrated regional efforts to upgrade international environmental law\u2014the non-binding resolutions of the 1992 R\u00edo Summit and, two decades later, R\u00edo+20, to name but two.\u00a0\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003E\u201cAbove all, this treaty aims to combat inequality and discrimination and to guarantee the rights of every person to a healthy environment and to sustainable development,\u201d writes Ant\u00f3nio Guterres, secretary general of the United Nations, in the agreement\u2019s \u003Ca href=\"https:\/\/repositorio.cepal.org\/bitstream\/handle\/11362\/43583\/1\/S1800428_en.pdf\"\u003Eforeword\u003C\/a\u003E. \u201cThe treaty devotes particular attention to persons and groups in vulnerable situations, and places equality at the core of sustainable development.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EBeyond the carefully curated and finely tuned rhetoric, though, Escaz\u00fa would substantially reorient El Salvador\u2019s laws and regulations in relation to the environment, according to Artiga. It would expand the scope of the country\u2019s freedom-of-information laws to include environmental information collected by government agencies and organizations receiving public funding, require grassroots involvement in the approval of development projects, and establish explicit legal protections for environmentalists and a unique complaint mechanism for related threats. The treaty also offers international consultation in the process of implementing its provisions. That said, the ultimate burden of enforcement and continuity would remain at the feet of participating governments.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EOn June 4th, the Escaz\u00fa Advocacy Team published an \u003Ca href=\"https:\/\/bit.ly\/2MvQyTK\"\u003Eopen letter\u003C\/a\u003E to President Bukele expressing its \u201cinterest, commitment, and willingness to accompany the State of El Salvador in the process of signing, ratifying, and implementing the Escaz\u00fa Agreement.\u201d It\u2019s not the first time the organization has reached out to the executive. In January, they proposed a working group of representatives from the executive branch, the United Nations, and the Escaz\u00fa Advocacy Team, with the goal of crafting a joint proposal to bring to the Legislative Assembly. To date, Artiga says, the Bukele administration hasn\u2019t responded.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EI sent an information request to the Presidential House\u2019s Public Information Access Unit on July 7th, asking that the administration specify the date in which it plans to sign the accord or, in the case that it is not planning to do so, to indicate that decision. At the close of this article, the Presidential House had yet to respond.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EEl Salvador isn\u2019t the only Central American country to put off signing and ratifying the accord. Of the seven countries in the isthmus, only Panama and Nicaragua have signed and ratified the accord; Guatemala and Costa Rica have signed but not yet ratified; El Salvador and Honduras, both negotiators of the treaty, have done neither; meanwhile, Belize took no part in the negotiations. To date only nine of the 22 negotiating countries have taken both steps. For the agreement to enter into force, 11 of the 22 must sign before the September deadline.\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EArtiga claims that the Escaz\u00fa Agreement can help to settle the \u201chistorical debt\u201d of the Salvadoran state\u2014not only toward its human inhabitants, but to all living creatures\u2014due to past and current systemic abuses. CESTA cites numerous species that are gradually disappearing from the Jiquilisco Bay and the system of rivers that discharge into it\u2014among them oysters, shrimp, turtles, and the evasive blue crabs that confounded Artiga\u2019s team.\u00a0\u003C\/p\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cbr\/\u003E\u003Cp dir=\"ltr\"\u003EIn El Salvador and beyond, creatures like blue crabs rarely take center stage in journalistic investigations, let alone in public debate. \u201cWith such environmental challenges it\u2019s very difficult for judges to pay any mind to that, especially when it hasn\u2019t garnered national attention,\u201d said Navarro. \u201cIt\u2019s easier when they\u2019ve killed an environmentalist or destroyed huge ecosystems that people can see. Standing up for tiny critters is a tough sell.\u201d\u003C\/p\u003E"}