Leticia [Colombia], Sep 7: Pioneers of nations home to Amazon have on Friday inked an agreement to share resources and pursue productive steps to safeguard the world’s largest rainforest.
The meeting, led by Colombia’s President Ivan Duque, took place in Leticia – the Colombian part home to the Amazon rainforest, according to Al-Jazeera news reports.
According to the “Leticia Amazon pact”, the Amazonian countries will “strengthen coordinated action”, “establish [a] regional cooperation mechanism”, “increase efforts associated with monitoring forest cover”, and “strengthen the capacities and participation of indigenous and tribal peoples”, among other steps. However, the agreement was thin on specifics.
Peruvian President Martin Vizcarra, Suriname Vice President Michael Adhin, Bolivian President Evo Morales, Ecuadorian President Lenin Moreno, Guyana Natural Resource Minister Raphael Trotman, and Brazilian Foreign Minister Ernesto Araujo, were among those who addressed the Friday meeting in Leticia.
Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who was not able to address the conference due to some health issues, joined the address via video conference. Moreover, Venezuela was uninvited to the conference.
The development has come against the major backdrop of escalating world outrage over the raging wildfires in parts of Amazon rainforest.
“We understand the urgency to protect this region, we understand that there are threats in the region, and that they are basically all the same in the countries meeting here today,” Duque said.
“It’s no surprise to anyone that in recent decades we’ve lost thousands of hectares of tropical rainforest because of the illegal expansion of the agricultural frontier as well as illegal extraction of minerals and the planting of illicit crops,” he added.
He also called on every leaders present at the conference to work together closely to fight the wildfires, as well as, share timely details over the protection of Amazon.
“When a brother country needs help, we should all do our best to help in these emergencies,” Duque said.
Peru’s Vizcarra agreed, saying, “If we look back at what’s been done over the past 40 years, it isn’t satisfactory. As a result we’ll change the strategy.” Peru has the fourth-largest amount of tropical forest in the world and second in Latin America, after Brazil.
Bolsonaro, via video conference, said the accord affirmed each nation’s sovereignty.