Defending Mother Earth: Bolivia's 'Bill of Rights for Mother Nature'
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Bolivia's President Evo Morales Ayma at the World People's Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth in Bolivia last year.
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Dr. Seuss fans will recall the stocky, moustached Lorax who burst from a felled tree stump and declared to an entrepreneurial logger, "I speak for the trees." The Lorax later spoke for the fish, fowl and other creatures, as toxic industrial muck muddied the waters and poisoned the air.
Grown-ups know that no one can actually, officially and authoritatively speak for Mother Nature. Yet Bolivia is taking a novel approach to natural stewardship by giving Mother Nature a voice and turning the American model on its head with a Bill of Rights for Mother Nature.
"All Americans want what's right for the environment, their families and their communities," said Matt Pitzarella, spokesman for the natural gas exploration and production company Range Resources and one of a dozen local stakeholders the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette asked to weigh in on the South American law. "But I think most working people would agree this [Bolivian policy] is a little out there."
Lawmakers in the landlocked country had a lot to tackle: the effects from generations of deforestation; unregulated silver, gold and tin mining; melting Andean glaciers and the iconic, evaporating Lake Titicaca. In 2010, Bolivia ranked 137th out of 163 countries in annual environmental performance index by Yale and Columbia universities. Iceland, Switzerland and Costa Rica lead the ranks while the U.S. is 61st, between Paraguay and Brazil.
Evo Morales Ayma, Bolivia's first indigenous president, called on world leaders at United Nations' climate talks to drastically reduce their carbon emissions in an effort to curb global warming.
This spring, Mr. Morales, who is a socialist and former leader of the coca-growers union, got congressional approval for a Bill of Rights for Mother Earth, that grants nature the same rights and liberties as human beings and treats resources as blessings.
It says Mother Earth has the right to exist, continue life cycles and be free from human alteration, the right to pure water and clean air, the right to equilibrium, the right not to be polluted or have cellular structures modified and the right not to be affected by development that could impact the balance of ecosystems.
First Published June 20, 2011 12:00 am
