Guatemala has decided not to renew the oil extraction contract on an area of approximately 30 square kilometers within the Tigre Lagoon, one of the most delicate areas of the Maya Biosphere Reserve.
His is a clear choice: to give up oil to strengthen the protection of one of the most important ecosystems in Central America, a refuge for jaguars, scarlet macaws and hundreds of threatened species.
The Tigre Lagoon is in fact part of a protected system of more than 3 thousand square kilometers, ecologically connected to Belize and Mexico, which allows Mesoamerican fauna to move freely beyond national borders. It is one of the most strategic biological corridors on the continent: precisely for this reason the presence of an oil field within it has always been a contradiction.
For years the extraction (entrusted to the Anglo-French company Perenco) was tolerated because it guaranteed important economic revenues for a developing country like Guatemala. But today the government admitted what environmentalists and local communities have been denouncing for some time: the operation is no longer worthwhile.
Between pollution, low oil prices and an increase in illegal activities in the reserve, the balance has become negative, both from an economic and environmental point of view.
The wells of the Xan oil field will therefore be closed and control will be strengthened over a territory that over the years has been plundered by illegal farming, deforestation, clandestine agriculture and illicit trafficking.
This marks the beginning of a process to regain control (the ambiguous point is that it will be entrusted to the Guatemalan army) of a vast part of the national territory that for too long has been exploited by actors dedicated to illegal activities, declared President Bernardo Arévalo.
A sentence that captures reality well: the Tigre Lagoon is one of the most devastated areas of the entire Mayan reserve. Every year thousands of hectares are destroyed to make way for illegal grazing and illegal cultivation. An ecological disaster before everyone’s eyes.
The Ministry of Defense and the National Civil Police will occupy the area of the former oil field to coordinate operations against these environmental crimes and initiate closer cooperation with Mexico and Belize, which is fundamental in a region where borders are porous and trafficking is transnational.
However, there is no shortage of criticism. According to some observers, the “green militarization” of the site risks being more of a symbolic move than a real change. The reserve already has security structures, but they are often ineffective due to corruption and lack of resources,
The risk is that only the formal control changes, not the substance.
However, there is a political fact that weighs heavily: in recent days a “state of siege” has been declared in Guatemala, to deal with a very complex situation: Guatemala is one of the most violent countries in Latin America, and at this moment criminal groups have ganged up against the state. Will there really be time to think about its wonderful nature?
