The Office of the Comptroller General of the Nation pointed out that deforestation in the country is “an environmental massacre”

The Office of the Comptroller General of the Republic presented a report stating that an average of 170,000 hectares of forests are lost each year, which is equivalent to a territory as large as Bogotá. The organization noted that this means that 500 hectares of forests are cut down daily, which represents irreversible damage to the environment, because it breaks with the biotic connectivity cycles of all ecosystems and generates an increase in CO2 emissions.

“The issue of climate change is hitting us and about 60% of the CO2 emissions emitted in the country are the result of these processes of deforestation, particularly because of the burning that is being made,” noted Gabriel Jurado, Delegate Comptroller for the Environment.

The warnings from the watchdog go hand in hand with the Ideam report, which states that everything is related to activities such as: the planting of crops for illicit use, bad practices of extensive livestock farming, agricultural expansion in unpermitted areas, illegal logging and the illicit extraction of minerals.

Let's remember that the most important warnings that have been made in the country are for the protection of the Amazon. For example, earlier this year, a group of academics and environmental experts asked the national government to take urgent measures to stop deforestation in the Colombian Amazon, following severe fires that affected large protected areas in the departments of Caquetá, Guaviare, Meta and Putumayo.

The academics asked President Iván Duque and the Minister of Environment, Carlos Eduardo Correa, to design a strategy to stop this environmental tragedy that is currently affecting the Tinigua National Natural Park, the Serranía de la Macarena and the Serranía de la Lindosa in which firefighters are needing volunteers and “do not have water or airborne systems to suppress fires”.

“We agree that immediate measures need to be taken to stop this alarming situation. It is urgent to design and implement a roadmap that articulately mobilizes the National Army, Firefighters throughout the country, civil defense and the Colombian Air Forces to stop this environmental tragedy that involves enormous social and ecological costs,” said the 190 signatories of the letter.

In this regard, they pointed out that the actions taken must be “preventive” rather than “reactive”, and stated that during November and December of last year the ideal conditions were presented for the worst fires that had been recorded for 15 years, with large amounts of accumulated wood, more than 40 days without rain, and strengthened land grabbing dynamics.

They also pointed out that “impunity for large deforesters, and the lack of a timely and effective response from the State,” have caused the northern Amazon to go to a point of irreparable damage, because what is at stake is the loss of biodiversity on which “life on the planet and the exacerbation of the climate crisis”.

“The Amazon biome plays a vital role in the availability of water for human consumption through “flying rivers”, water retention capacity, and evapotranspiration. Because of the fires, we are emitting carbon monoxide and sulfur dioxide, which are greenhouse gases in quantities that affect even other countries, which makes us internationally responsible if we do not act immediately,” said the experts.

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