Focus on Mexico: Protecting the Environment and Public Health

In his inaugural address, Mexico President Vicente Fox promised to build a "Mexico with an environmental conscience." A growing network of public interest environmental lawyers across Mexico are making sure President Fox keeps his promise.

Just six years ago, when E-LAW U.S. began looking to support Mexican advocates, Centro Mexicano de Derecho Ambiental (CEMDA) in Mexico City was the only environmental law group in the country. Today, E-LAW is working with five public interest environmental law organizations and several independent lawyers across the country.

After a meeting of the Red Mexicana de Derecho Ambiental (RMDA - Mexican Environmental Law Network) in Morelia, Michoacan, advocates enjoy the sights in Angangueo. (E-LAW U.S. Staff Attorney Jennifer Gleason can be seen at the far right.) In communities across Mexico, public interest lawyers face similar environmental challenges: ill-conceived power projects, inadequate environmental impact assessments, dangerous use of pesticides and more. To draw on each other`s experience defending citizens` rights to a clean and healthy environment, lawyers and environmental advocates across Mexico came together to form RMDA.

E-LAW U.S. has teamed with Mexican partners to hold training workshops in 16 cities over the past four years. The workshops have educated lawyers and citizens about their rights under Mexico`s environmental laws and encouraged citizens to exercise these rights. Support for these workshops from the C.S. Mott Foundation and NAFEC has helped nurture a new generation of Mexican public interest environmental lawyers.

Carlos Baumgarten, head of CEMDA`s litigation team, is working with E-LAW to protect Mexico`s biodiversity and ecosystems. Carlos is currently representing communities in Xcacel, 67 miles south of Cancun, that are opposing construction of a 1,400 room hotel next to one of the world`s last pristine turtle sanctuaries.

Following a three-month visit to E-LAW U.S. in 1997, Doctor Raquel Nájera Gutiérrez returned to her home in Guadalajara and formed the first environmental law NGO outside of Mexico City: Instituto de Derecho Ambiental (IDEA). Raquel is leading efforts to protect and restore Lake Chapala, the largest natural lake in Mexico. She is also working with communities to challenge the construction of thermoelectric plants near Sierra del Abra Tanchipa nature reserve.

In Veracruz, Attorney Claudio Torres is working on natural protected area regulations for the state. Claudio works for the Centro de Derecho Ambiental e Integración Económica del Sur (DASSUR).

Threats to the environment and public health in Mexico are a serious challenge. The New York Times reports: "In Acuna, as in other border settlements, Mexican workers earn such miserable wages and American companies pay such minimal taxes that its schools are a shambles, its hospital crumbling, its trash collection slapdash, and its sewage lines collapsed." (NYT, 2/15/01)

In Chihuahua and Tijuana, attorneys Agustin Bravo and Carla García Zendejas are working with E-LAW to make a difference. Agustin works with Fuerza Ambiental in Chihuahua to protect state forests and challenge pollution from maquiladoras. Carla, co-founder of Yeuani: los que luchan (those who fight) in Tijuana, provides free services to maquiladora women working in factories along the U.S./Mexico border and has gained justice for women overcome by fumes in a poorly ventilated factory.

Mexico`s splendid biodiversity and fragile ecosystems are under continuous threat from over-fishing, deforestation and uncontrolled development. While much work lies ahead for the defenders of Mexico`s environment, E-LAW U.S. stands ready to help its partners in Mexico fight for a clean and biodiverse environment.