ENVIRONMENT-CENTRAL AMERICA: Greens Attack Shrimp Industry

By Thelma Mejía Reprint | | Print |

Thelma Mejia

SAN LORENZO, Honduras, Mar 28 1996 (IPS) - The environmental watchdogs of Greenpeace are accusing the local shrimp industry of destroying mangrove swamps and threatening marine life in the Gulf of Fonseca on the Pacific Ocean side of Central America.

Shared by Honduras, Nicaragua and El Salvador, the gulf is regarded as one of Central America’s natural treasures with rich fisheries and diverse marine resources. The 1,000 square kilometers of waterways includes mangrove forests, streams, flood plains, and winter lagoons but, in the last 10 years, the natural wealth of the area been depleted by the cultivated shrimp industry.

Last weekend, Greenpeace sailed one of its ships, the Moby Dick, into the Gulf of Fonseca to evaluate the damage to the mangroves and other area species.

Central American Greenpeace coordinator Lorenzo Cardenal said the gulf had suffered “tremendous” damage. “We’re worried that this beautiful coastal area will soon become Central America’s first desert,” he declared.

“Enough destruction. It’s necessary to stop the irresponsible growth of the shrimp industry in the Gulf of Fonseca, and that’s why we’ve started an international campaign here to defend the mangroves,” Cardenal said.

An IPS correrspondent, tooring the area, confirmed the desertification of various gulf estuaries and found many abandoned artificial lagoons in areas formerly covered by dense, green mangrove swamps.

Intended for shrimp farming, the underused lagoons “should never have been built because there is no need for them,” Greenpeace asserted.

“We do not oppose the development of the shrimp industry. But we want them to use appropriate methods of sustainable development that allow the mangrove swamps to recover,” Cardenal said.

Greenpeace says the shrimp industry uses inappropriate production technologies, including chemicals, vaccines and fertilizers, that destroy the area’s coastal species. These methods compromise the mangrove swamp’s crucial role in the ecosystem as a filter between the land and the sea.

Jorge Varela, a leader of the Honduran Committee to Defend the Flora and Fauna of the Gulf of Fonseca (Coodefagol), explained that destroying the swamps allows chemicals to reach the sea directly and “kill marine species.”

“Environmental destruction is occurring that hurts all of us. Unless it changes its methods, the shrimp industry will cause the death of the gulf, but the industry’s promoters don’t want to understand this,” Varela said.

A study conducted by the United Nations Peace University found that the total area occupied by shrimp farms in the Central American isthmus rose from 1,000 hectares to 11,500 hectares in the past 10 years.

The area covered by Honduran mangrove swamps fell by 50 percent between 1950 and 1987, and those in Guatemala and El Salvador declined by more than 20 percent in the last decade.

Nicaragua loses 355 mangrove swamp hectares a year in the area know as Estero Real. Costa Rica and Panama also show declines that are mainly blamed on the salt industry and, to a lesser degree, shrimp farming.

Confronting the depradation of the Gulf of Fonseca, local Honduran, Nicaraguan and Salvadoran fishermen formed a Trinational Commission to defend the mangrove swamps a year ago. The group is collaborating with Greenpeace to start a worldwide consumer boycott of local shrimp.

Coodefagol president Saul Montufar explained that the campaign will seek to raise consumer “awareness” of what goes into enjoying a plate of shrimp.

“People who ask for that dish don’t know that natural resources are being destroyed to bring it to them. If we explain that the price of the shrimp they’re eating is the death of many marine species and even the whole gulf, they’ll understand that they should oppose the shrimp industry’s destructive activities,” he said.

The boycott will be launched in upcoming months and is intended to compel the shrimp industry to change its production methods.

Shrimp has become Honduras’s third largest export, generating close to