Biologist and environmental activist Alejandro Álvarez demanded during the regional forum «Venezuela: Escazú Agreement already«, held this Friday, that Venezuela adhere to the Regional Agreement on Access to Information, Public Participation and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters in Latin America and the Caribbean, better known as the Escazú Agreement.
Álvarez explained that, according to the studies that have been carried out in the last 10 years on the environmental situation in Venezuela, there is evidence of progressive environmental deterioration.
Problems in which it is reflected in environmental damage
He said that these results can be evidenced in two big problems. First, access to drinking waterwhich according to Álvarez affects between 82 and 96% of the entire Venezuelan population “who do not receive water on a regular basis and its quality is not adequate for human consumption.”
According to their data, this crisis began in 2014. “In that year the national government said that the largest drought in the last 60 years had occurred in Venezuela. Since then, the country has some places with extreme cruelty because water arrives once or twice a month, or it doesn’t. There is no information if we continue in the same drought, if there is any progress to protect the population.
Second, he referred to environmental damage caused by mining south of the Orinoco, in Bolívar state.
He indicated that these actions have repercussions on environmental damage such as the contamination of the area where 80% of the rivers in Venezuela are found.
“This is producing an increase in malaria in conditions that have not been seen for more than 60 years, in fact, Venezuela is exporting malaria to neighboring countries,” Álvarez said.
He also highlighted the constant oil spills that “are produced by the state company Pdvsa«.
For his part, the geographer and researcher Jorge Padrón explained that Venezuela’s adherence to the Escazú Agreement is important to “get out of the quagmire and stagnation in which environmental law finds itself in the country.”