By Thelma Mejía
CHOLUTECA, Honduras, Oct 18 1996 (IPS)

Representatives of some 20 environmentalist groups from Latin America, Europe and Asia meeting in Honduras this week called for a global moratorium on the expansion of the shrimp farming industry.

Unsustainable shrimp farming practices are causing serious damage to the marine ecosystems of countries like India, Ecuador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Brazil, Bangladesh and Thailand, warned the forum, which met in the southern Honduran city of Choluteca.

Choluteca lies on the Gulf of Fonseca, where – according to the international environmental organisation Greenpeace, one of the meeting’s organisers – more than 3,000 hectares of mangroves have been destroyed over the past nine years, the majority by unsustainable shrimp farming practices.

The Gulf of Fonseca, shared by Honduras, Nicaragua and El Salvador, is one of Central America’s most beautiful coastal areas.

Greenpeace’s Matthew Gianni told IPS Thursday that if the countries do not join forces to “curb the expansion of shrimp farming, the planet will suffer dreadful ecological consequences.

“If we start to pressure now for the declaration of a global moratorium against the expansion of the industry, we might make it on time…development does not mean the destruction of natural resources.”

The Oct. 15-16 forum drew up the “Declaration of Choluteca” which seeks to curb the growth of shrimp farming. The document will be sent to the United Nations and multilateral lending institutions in an attempt to influence aid to Third World countries that practice shrimp farming.

Saul Montufar, with the Honduran Committee for the Defence of Flora and Fauna of the Gulf of Fonseca (Coodefagol) – another of the groups coordinating the forum – said environmentalists are not opposed to the shrimp industry but to its current operating methods.

The forum criticised the use of chemical-based methods that destroy and exhaust marine species, rather than sustainable operating procedures that would guarantee a rational use of resources.

“We are aware that the shrimp industry brings development and jobs” to Latin American nations, the head of Coodefagol, Jorge Varela, told IPS. “The only thing we are asking is that…environmental impact studies be undertaken,” and sustainable methods used.

Honduran Environment Minister Carlos Medina said his office is aware of the damage shrimp farming operations are causing. “We declared a year-long moratorium, to be prolonged if necessary, on the expansion of the industry a month ago,” during which no new licenses will be issued.

Forum participants applauded Medina’s call for an in-depth environmental impact study in the Gulf of Fonseca, and his statement that “development and sustainability must not be understood in terms of profits.”

The Choluteca meeting also studied sustainable operating methods that would curb the destruction of mangroves and other frail ecosystems.

The local shrimp industry organised its workers in protest marches this week, and described the forum as “foreign meddling” in its interests.

The marine resources of Honduras and Nicaragua could be completely exhausted if the shrimp farming industry, which has grown in a disorderly fashion over the past eight years, is not controlled.

In Ecuador, the top producer of farmed shrimp in Latin America and fourth in the world, shrimp farming has nearly exhausted marine resources, denounced Ecological Action, an environmentalist organisation from Quito.

Excerpt: