Ecuador struggled with a weak democratic government throughout the mid-1900’s. As a result of this governmental weakness, control of the country was seized by a military junta in the early 1970’s and they remained in power until 1978. Under the junta, economic reforms were passed and urban development saw large investments. However, the majority of the funding for these public works was derived from wide-scale resource extraction, with particular interest placed on growing the country’s oil industry. Additionally, the junta increased the public and private debts of the country significantly as another form of funding. By 1982, debt repayments would compromise well over two thirds of Ecuador’s gross domestic product. It was under these conditions that Ecuador transitioned back into a new democracy in 1978. These horrific economic and environmental conditions fostered a growing sense of outrage and responsibility in Ecuador’s citizens. These feelings eventually lead to the beginnings of Ecuador’s environmental movement and the founding of Fundación Natura in 1978. Natura was a conservation-focused non-profit that was formed from amateur environmentalists and scientists from academia. Many of their early projects revolved around improving environmental education in the country, and to that end they partnered with USAID within a couple months of their founding. Through the grants they received from USAID, Natura was able to create an environmental profile of the environmental issues in Ecuador and possible development pathways. Natura remained the largest and most mainstream environmental organization within Ecuador up until 1985. This year saw the creation of the Society for the Defense of Nature and its more prominent sub-group Accion Ecologica, or AE. Instead of focusing on environmental conservation, AE choose to pursue causes related to societal and economic issues related to sustainable development. Community organization and mobilization were foundational aspects of AE which lead to women making up a large percentage of the organization’s membership. Despite these two organizations sharing similar overarching goals, the relationship between them was rocky at the best of times. Using the classifications established in Chapter 3, Natura is an example of an Eco-Dependent organization. Before they received international funding, Natura was small, and volunteer based. After investment from USAID, they created a large headquarters in Quito with a permanent staff to push for governmental reforms. In contrast, AE were Eco-Resisters. AE refused international funding and worked with local communities and volunteers to fight the growing number of resource extraction projects in Ecuador, particularly oil drilling and logging. While Natura worked with international and national groups to create market-based solutions to environmental problems, AE created grass-roots social movements to address all aspects of sustainable development. This included more than just the environment, as AE drew attention towards the rights of indigenous groups in the Amazon and continued attempts to private public resources like water in important areas of Ecuador. These stark differences in philosophy kept these two major groups from working together despite sharing similar goals (Dosh & Kligerman, September 9, 2009). Given the differences between these two groups, I largely would have supported the grass-roots efforts of AE. While it is important to work within the system and attempt to implement long-term change, the weakened state of the Ecuadorian government would limit the amount of real societal change that could be accomplished. AE provided the opportunity for many of Ecuador’s citizens to get involved the environmental movement without having any real formal education in environmental fields and participate in important projects. Additionally, AE’s philosophy of targeting social issues instead of purely focusing on conservation is a more worth-while goal. While conservation can preserve certain areas of the environment, its does very little towards actually addressing the underlying issues that put those conserved areas under threat to begin with. AE and Natura continued to remain at odds with each other up until 1987. It was during this year that both national and international organizations agreed to hold a meeting on Ecuador’s environmental issues and movement. By the end of this meeting, the Ecuadorian government had decided to create the Ecuadorian Committee for the Defense of Nature, a government organization dedicated to addressing and improving the societal, economic, and environmental conditions present in Ecuador. This committee was a major steppingstone towards bridging the gap between the sides of the Eco-Resisters like AE and Eco-Dependents like Natura, allowing the country to work towards solving its issues together. In addition to the formation of this committee, Ecuador was also one of the recipients of the world’s first debt-for-nature swaps in 1987. Debt-for-nature swaps worked through foreign governments or environmental organizations purchasing part of the recipient country’s debt while charging smaller amounts on the debt. In return, the recipient country sends the debt payments into a trust fund that would be used to fund conservation and sustainable development efforts within the country. Debt-for-nature swaps were designed to be targeted towards countries that were deeply in debt, had a significant amount of biodiversity, and had established environmental organizations to act as the beneficiaries. Based on these general requirements, Ecuador was a perfect candidate and Natura received the first of the three debt-swaps that occurred in Ecuador, allowing the country to invest over nine million dollars into conservation efforts. These swaps were a major benefit to Ecuador as they allowed the country to provide funding for conservation and slowly gain back its footing in the world economy (Debt for nature and more conservation finance, n.d) Despite the momentum of Ecuador’s environmental movement and the implementation of debt-for-nature swaps, Ecuador still remained deeply in debt due to the actions of past governments. In order to satisfy creditors from the United States, foreign companies had to be given preferential business contracts and the oil industry continued to expand. By 1985, oil accounted for 60% of Ecuador’s total state budget and it was receiving approximately one third of all the United States’ direct foreign investment. This large reliance on the United States further weakened Ecuador’s already shaken government, leading to very few environmental policies or regulations to be passed. These dismal conditions would continue until the neoliberal boom of the 1990’s.
Debt for Nature and more Conservation Finance. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://globalforestatlas.yale.edu/amazon/conservation-initiatives/investment-forestry
Dosh, P., & Kligerman, N. (2009, September 1). Under Fire: Ecuadors Acción Ecológica. Retrieved from https://nacla.org/article/under-fire-ecuador’s-acción-ecológica