Greenpeace Denounces Destruction Of 57 Hectares Of Mangroves In Cancun, Mexico

Last week, environmentalists denounced the overnight destruction of 57 hectares of mangroves in Cancun’s Malecón Tajamar, which is a tourist complex financed by Mexico’s federal tourism development agency, Fonatur. News reports indicated that heavy machinery entered the property on January 16 protected by police, knowing there was already a movement against the devastation of the area, “Salvemos Manglar Tajamar” (Let’s sabe Manglar Tajamar) which had actually halted the project before.

Fonatur is an agency ironically known for allowing destructive projects like such, and Greenpeace Mexico even reported they moved forward by falsely claiming they’d had environmental assessment and denying the mere existence of a mangrove in the area. Even though the damage is done, there’s still a bigger cause to fight for; Greenpeace believes that the area could reestablish itself if it’s left untouched and stakeholders stop working on it.

According to FAO, 35 percent of mangroves in the world have been lost during the last two decades due to indiscriminative destruction for wood and housing developments. Not only is this extremely fracturing to all ecosystems around the area, leaving every species who inhabited it without a home, and other villages and towns without any flood protection. For that, and many other reasons, this is an issue that affects the world we live in. Hopefully the Mexican government will listen and, at the very least, stop the project.

In the search for someone to blame, some accused former President Felipe Calderón, who not only denied the allegations but reminded people he passed a law banning all mangrove destruction in 2006.