President Gabriel Boric talks with Mario Cimoli, interim executive secretary of ECLAC, at the opening of the Conference of the Parties (COP 1), Santiago. DPA via Europa Press (Europa Press)
President Gabriel Boric opened this Wednesday the first Conference of the Parties (COP1) of the Escazú environmental agreement with Chile as host, but not a member.
Although the South American country was one of the promoters of the pioneering treaty that seeks to guarantee access to information, citizen participation and Justice in environmental matters, the government of Sebastián Piñera decided in 2020 not to join.
“I hope that we will soon become a state party”, Boric has advanced, who in his first week in La Moneda sent a bill to Congress with great urgency so that Chile joins the binding pact.
"For our government, it is essential to resume the regional leadership that Chile had in the past in this matter and focus it on promoting the consolidation of this agreement throughout Latin America," said the president in the first activity of the meeting of three days held at the headquarters of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), in Santiago.
Of the 33 countries in the region, 24 countries signed the agreement in 2018, but since then only 12 have ratified it through their Congresses, including Mexico, Bolivia and Uruguay.
Countries such as Brazil, Peru or Colombia have not signed up.
Costa Rica, which along with Chile were the main promoters of the agreement, has not ratified either.
Its vice president, Epsy Campbell, participated this morning via videoconference: "Our societies have become polarized in absurd debates about the dilemma of environmental conservation and the challenge of sustainable development," she pointed out.
"I am very sorry that in the middle of the 21st century there are those who propose that false dichotomy, with false premises, that do not allow us to advance in public policies and legislation that understand the immense challenge that lies ahead," she added.
In 2012, during Piñera's first term, the idea of the treaty emerged and the negotiating machinery was put in place to carry it out.
Six years later, in the businessman's second government, he announced that Chile would not sign it.
The Foreign Ministry and the Ministry of the Environment argued that the agreement introduced a series of undefined principles that would condition environmental legislation and that it introduced “ambiguous, broad and indefinite” obligations for the State, among other reasons that surprised local and international authorities.
To make a difference with the position of the previous Administration, Boric arrived this morning accompanied by the Chancellor Antonia Urrejola and the Minister of the Environment, Maisa Rojas.
“This treaty is going to reduce the socio-environmental conflict that exists in the country by opening an early and significant dialogue.
This will unlock the false paradigm that economic development goes against environmental protection.
At this point, the loss of biodiversity is irreversible and the well-being of all Chileans depends on a healthy nature,” said Rojas, who hopes that Congress will approve the bill this year for Chile to adhere to the agreement.
The treaty seeks to guarantee the right to information, participation and justice in environmental issues.
On the subject of participation, for example, it is stipulated that representatives of civil society participate in the negotiations.
"If these three rights are guaranteed, it can improve decision-making, and guarantee other human rights, such as the human right to live in a healthy environment," added the environment minister.
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