Save Mexico's Coral Reefs!

The Mesoamerican Reef is the largest coral reef barrier in the western hemisphere and extends over 1,000 kilometers along the coastlines of Mexico, Belize, Guatemala, and Honduras. Uncontrolled and intense coastal development, anthropogenic interventions, and degradation of ecosystems over wide extensions of these coasts are among the greatest threats to the MAR region. While all four countries have made concerted efforts to manage, conserve, and protect coastal ecosystems, there has been a lack of transparency in the governance framework, poor implementation, a disconnect between management and research, and geopolitical differences, which have played a role in reducing management efficacy.

AIDA has developed the report “Assessing Legal Opportunities to Improve the Health and Resilience of the Mesoamerican Reef” to document and analyze opportunities to improve the protection of the region, including of course Mexico. To produce the document, we have collaborated with local, national, and international partners to collect ideas and compile the most promising opportunities from the legal perspective to revamp management and conservation in the MAR region, with a particular focus on policy and litigation strategies.

In doing so, one of these recommendations is to set up a "task force" to solve the great problem of contamination of the MAR, caused by the lack of sanitation of the rivers that flow into the area. Excessive use of pesticides, inadequate management of solid waste -especially plastic-, lack of wastewater treatment and tremendous deforestation are some of the causes that contaminate the riverside ecosystems and end up in the ocean, where the MAR's coral reefs are found.

AIDA is leading the formation of this task force, and we will continue to accompany our partner organizations with our legal expertise. We are also reviewing the possibility of a regional litigation to ensure the compliance and enforcement of legal dispositions regarding the prevention of pollution of rivers that flow directly to the MAR.

With great emotion and pride we want to share that on February 9th the Mexican Supreme Court of Justice unanimously ruled in favor of protecting the Veracruz Reef System, the people who depend on and benefit from it, and to recognize the collective nature of the right to a healthy environment and public participation in environmental assessment processes.

In 2016, in the absence of adequate environmental impact assessment processes the Veracruz port expansion project was approved without considering impacts to the environment. And the government initiated the expansion of the port despite the fact that such construction would cause significant damage to the coral reef, which is a natural protected area and a Ramsar site (protected wetland).

AIDA has been collaborating closely with our partner CEMDA since 2014 in this case. Through the years we have sent urgent alerts to international authorities alerting about the impacts to the reef and actively supported media efforts to position the issue.

In January 2022, AIDA and our partner Earthjustice filed an Amicus brief requesting that the provisions on legitimate interest and the possibility of accessing environmental justice in Mexico be expanded. We provided arguments of climate justice, human rights, and international law to protect coral reefs, seagrasses, and endemic biodiversity of Veracruz.

This ruling recognizes an expanded legitimate interest, the protection of coral reefs, and orders the transformation of the way in which environmental impact assessments are carried out. The ruling was approved unanimously, which means that it becomes a binding precedent for Mexican courts. This precedent is very important for the region because it obliges the Mexican government to comply with elements of environmental protection, access to environmental justice, and points out the obligations contained in the Escazú Agreement. In addition, protecting this reef ecosystem is key to combating and protecting coastal communities from the effects of climate change.

We are extremely happy for this ruling and to be part of this important victory for the protection of reefs and the right to public participation.

Links:

• Defending the Veracruz Reef Project