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“If Conabio were a living organism, what the recent Government decree does is slowly starve it,” says José Sarukhán, biologist and author of countless scientific works, who in 1992 founded the National Commission for the Knowledge and Use of Conabio. Biodiversity (Conabio). This organization, which has created a detailed archive of Mexico's biodiversity with 46 million validated and georeferenced organisms, came to attract the attention of President Barack Obama's advisors, who recommended that it be replicated in the United States. It was created three decades ago in the search for Mexico to propose something truly innovative at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, but a decree from the Government of Andrés Manuel López Obrador seeks to incorporate the commission into the structure of the Environment Secretariat. Environment and Natural Resources, Semarnat. The decree was sent to the National Commission for Regulatory Improvement (Conamer), but has not yet been published in the Official Gazette of the Federation.
“Cutting the budgets of this organization is something that has to do with everyone's lives, with our well-being and that of our grandchildren. Because the information that has been collected there and is available to everyone—more than 45,000 people visit us a day on our website—translates into decision-making that truly appeals to the territories. When you have real information about the biodiversity of a country, you can make decisions about things that are affecting one species or another,” explains José Sarukhán, who resigned from his position at Conabio in 2022 due to differences with Semarnat, which he named as new executive secretary of the organization Daniel Quezada, an economist little known in the scientific and environmental circle.
In recent weeks, experts like Sarukhán have warned that the cuts announced to Conabio put at risk an information system thanks to which, for example, changes have been achieved in the forestry network of sustainable development so that the agricultural frontier cannot reach the conservation points; create a national alert to stop the arrival of the cactus moth to the country, or, as happened in Tamaulipas, ensure that whoever destroyed a mangrove has to pay for that damage given the evidence that there were more than 20 hectares protected in that territory.
The decree has generated alarm among the national scientific community. Added to the hundred comments on the proposal is the letter of concern published by the rector of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), Leonardo Lomelí Vanegas, which reads: “As a result of this modification, it is difficult to effectively carry out inter-secretary work, which will mean a setback in the State's capacity to address environmental challenges and adapt to political fluctuations, putting at risk the great value of Mexico's natural capital and that decision-making for the sustainable development of the country will be carried out in an informed manner.”
Butterfly cage at the Chapultepec Zoo, created with the support of CONABIO in Mexico City. Antonio Cruz (CUARTOSCURO)
The Government's decision on Conabio does not occur in a vacuum. In 2019, the then head of Semarnat, Víctor Manuel Toledo, published a letter in which he assured that the entity “was experiencing an anomalous or exceptional situation within the administration” and made it clear that this body recommended “the immediate transformation of the commission “intersecretariat to a decentralized public body.” In addition, the suppression of the private-public trust that was used in the entity for 27 years, and which totaled more than 827 million pesos (almost 50 million dollars), was stipulated, with the justification that it was not in accordance with the policy of austerity of the López Obrador Government.
In a statement sent to América Futura, Semarnat defends that this measure seeks to “make the management and actions of the agencies and organizations that make up” this agency more transparent and strengthen it. “The regulations that were more than 30 years old did not give regulatory certainty. With the modification of the organic structure, within the internal regulations of Semarnat, continuous improvement and modernization of public management is guaranteed, providing legal certainty to the Scientific and Technical Coordinating Unit for Knowledge, Conservation and Sustainable Use of Biodiversity. This will promote public policies on biodiversity,” adds the organization. Furthermore, he assures that the budget cut will not affect its operation, since "with the budget and personnel of the secretariat, the structure was adjusted under the principles of rationality and republican austerity."
However, the measure, which appears to be in line with the budget cuts suffered by the National Institute of Ecology and Climate Change and the National Forestry Commission, has also generated strong rejection from the political opposition. “Under the idea that there is corruption in everything, far from reviewing, putting people responsible or improving, the option has been taken to disappear institutions that are part of the Mexican State and that provide necessary information to outline successful policies,” laments the representative. Edna Díaz Acevedo (PRD), who chairs the Congressional climate change commission.
This is not the first time that President Andrés Manuel López Obrador's environmental policy has been highlighted for its contradictions, which, on the one hand, bleed through institutions that—like Conabio—were intersecretarial, that is, they worked transversally with the country's entire development agenda. and they were far from the ideologies and parties in power; and, on the other hand, they increase the amount for Annex 16 of the budgets, which has to do with mitigation and adaptation to climate change.
“There is no such contradiction: when you focus point by point on all the lines into which Annex 16 is divided, you realize that it is used for everything except the environment,” congresswoman Díaz Acevedo, however, rebukes. “For scholarships, refineries, the Mayan Train, but it is not used for the protection of diversity, or mitigation of climate change. I can understand that they are not interested in the environment, but not that they destroy institutions that have nothing to do with the opposition or power group,” she says.
With the data that Conabio has collected, there is, as José Sarukhán explains, a lot of information that can still be worked on as a file, “but if it is not updated, there comes a time when it becomes outdated, when you begin to make decisions blindly.” The other problem that the academic sees is the loss of people who have worked in that organization. “It will take decades to have that community again. With this incorporation into Semarnat, that human capital that has been formed for years disappears. Losing that will involve us in the future re-recruiting a lot of people, re-training them, starting over while the speed of environmental problems will only have accelerated. On the contrary, what we should be doing now is uniting the best people we have at hand, with the best information that has been generated to help the country make decisions,” he points out.
A mangrove in Puerto Morelos, protected by CONABIO.Elizabeth Ruiz (CUARTOSCURO)
In the face of criticism, Semarnat asks for calm: “You can rest assured because Conabio's work does not disappear, it only strengthens and makes its actions transparent in public policies on biodiversity and aimed at knowledge of biological diversity, conservation and sustainable use. ", they respond in the statement in which they assure that the organization will continue working "in a transversal way" with the "different sectors involved" in environmental conservation. “The environmental policy of the Government of Mexico considers scientific research and studies essential to conserve biodiversity in our country, always with people and communities at the center of our work. The preservation of our biocultural heritage is one of our priority objectives in Semarnat's sustainable development strategy,” he concludes.
These are answers that at some point those responsible for this secretariat may have to give before Congress if an initiative by Congresswoman Edna Díaz Acevedo goes forward who wants to call Semarnat to account and explain why these decisions are being made. “With some members of the commission that I chair, we are building a point of agreement to urge the executive to reverse these actions. Additionally, we are working on a bill so that it is legally established that decisions involving entities of that magnitude and depth do not depend on the occurrences or decisions of the president in office, or a secretary of state, that there is a framework that protects them no matter who comes to power,” he maintains.
For José Sarukhán, for his part, the survival of institutions that ensure the protection and conservation of ecosystems, plants and oxygen, that monitor and protect biodiversity - which is essential for the life of Mexico - now depends above all on the pressure that civil society can exert. “The only way to defend them is to have an informed citizenry that knows the importance of their institutions. People have to be more aware and more active, if that does not happen there will be no sufficiently enlightened politician to take that position against economic interests,” he concludes.