Although it seems that the dunes are only a mound of sand, in reality they form a complex system that needs to be comprehensively protected against urban growth for tourism and real estate purposes that threatens to disappear them, says Saraí Gómez, research coordinator for the northwestern office of the Mexican Center for Environmental Law (Cemda).
“They say, 'behind the second cordon of dunes you can build now', but behind that cordon there is still a dune. So it's also understanding that it's a complex system and that we benefit from it. We need to conserve it if we want to maintain our quality of life. We must try to maintain those elements that make us have it,” explains Gómez.
Baja California Sur, in northwestern Mexico, ranks first among the entities with the most dunes, since it has 27.4% of the country's coastal dunes. However, it has already been warned of a potential for change in the coastline due to urban growth for residential purposes that threatens this ecosystem (Rodríguez, 2017).
In an interview with Causa Natura Media, Sarahi Gómez shares what is needed to prevent the erosion and disappearance of coastal dunes due to anthropogenic activities.
El Mogote dunes in the Bay of La Paz. Source: Daniela Reyes
What ecosystem services do dunes provide?
These systems are the first front in the face of strong winds, hurricanes and coastal floods; they are also important for water filtration, so all that is lost when you remove the dune and lose it forever. In addition, a large number of organisms live there, from insects, crustaceans, reptiles to mammals and plants.
What must be protected for dune conservation?
The dune system is related to the beach and the beach to the marine part, so this is a framework and you cannot assume that one thing is independent of the other. The dunes are a whole system that includes other ecosystems that are on the coastline and that because of the interactions they have, it becomes important to contemplate their protection from an integral environment. In the case of regulation, this comprehensive protection should be explicit considering all the components of the system, both the dunes and other associated coastal ecosystems, to ensure that the activities, which are being authorized, have as little impact as possible.
What instruments currently protect the dune system in La Paz?
There are ecological criteria that are mainly in management instruments such as Ecological Management Programs at different levels (state and municipal), but these should include protection criteria.
Unfortunately, we are a little behind in the case of the Local Ecological Management Program (POEL) for the municipality of La Paz, as they are still in this process for the construction of the instrument; in this instrument, ecological criteria have already been defined for the protection and conservation of the dune system, but it is not yet in force.
People sandboarding in the dunes of El Mogote. Source: Daniela Reyes
Are there any that are already available?
We do have another instrument, which is the Urban Development Program (PDU), which contemplates criteria that have to do with environmental issues. It has certain definitions for some of the ecosystems, including dunes. There are guidelines for dunes there, but we have found in the case of the Peace PDU that there are many inconsistencies, that is, things that contradict each other and ambiguities.
In addition, nowhere does it explicitly state what activities are going to be restricted or prohibited, and from our point of view as Cemda, we believe that certain prohibitions must be established to guarantee the protection of these ecosystems.
What is the main threat to the dunes?
We have detected that there are a lot of advertisements advertising the sale of lots in El Mogote, for example, which is practically a dune area, and there are already signs of lotification on the dunes.
We have denounced the complete removal of significant volumes of sand, which are obviously associated with tourism real estate projects. Currently, we have a legal action, a lawsuit before Profepa, against the clearing and removal of dunes in El Mogote and right now we are waiting for the authority to resolve it.
This dune removal and the clearing that we denounce correspond to the site of a project, Lumai Peninsula. They are going to open now in spring and they have their map, the concept of the project and they are already announcing it on different networks.
How are these real estate projects linked to the legal instruments that protect the dunes?
This is also one of the gaps, one of the needs is to strengthen these management instruments; since the PDU is ambiguous, on the one hand it protects you and on the other hand it tells you that you can carry out activities on the dunes. It seems that the series of authorizations they must have to start promoting your project is not well established, since it is not even a project that has entered an environmental impact assessment (Lumai Peninsula), so there is no change in land use and we don't know if it has any opinion from the Department of Ecology of the City of La Paz. And this is important because it generates speculation.
What should be banned in the dunes?
There is a manual of guidelines for the management of the Semarnat dune system but it is not binding; it is just a manual of recommendations that you can follow if you want. What we (Cemda) commented at the time is that in order to make them binding, these guidelines could be incorporated into the PDU and the POEL.
Here in the state, it would have to be guaranteed that whatever you are going to do on the dune preserves the environmental services that the system provides. For example, do not alter the patterns of sediment flows; that the circulation of coastal currents will not be modified; that air currents will not be obstructed; that the native vegetation of the dunes is not removed; that there will be no vehicle traffic on dunes; and that access to sites during the nesting of species is restricted. These are several elements that contribute to the health of the ecosystem, since you should be taking care of each component.
How to reconcile the conservation of the dune with its use as an element of local culture?
It's one thing to slide on a board on a dune and another thing to take a vehicle with huge tires to ramp over the dune, it's different.
The necessary studies should be done to decide which activity has the least impact because the volume you move and the pressure that is exerted on the dune is different between a sandboard and a round of large tires. Nor is it treated as 'don't touch the dunes and don't climbe', the area of El Mogote is certainly cultural, but studies are required to reconcile what can be done and under certain criteria considering the carrying capacity of the system, the fragility of the place and the species that are present in the site.
We can agree to even have these delimited “sacrifice sites” where, historically, the ramping activity has been carried out so that people continue to enjoy that space, while respecting zoning because that's what co-responsibility is all about.
*This article was originally published in Causa Natura Media.
Comentarios (0)