Honduras declares ‘environmental emergency’ in Río Plátano Biosphere Reserve

Résumé détaillé

Deforestation, organized crime and the expansion of cattle ranching have led the government in Honduras to announce an “environmental emergency” in the Río Plátano Biosphere…

Deforestation, organized crime and the expansion of cattle ranching have led the government in Honduras to announce an “environmental emergency” in the Río Plátano Biosphere Reserve, the largest protected area in the country.

The 36-month emergency, issued as a presidential decree on Nov. 10, will devote 1.5 billion Honduran lempiras (more than $55 million) over the next three years to halt “environmental deterioration,” according to an official statement.

“The initiative represents a commitment by the government to move from addressing threats to sustained intervention, with defined resources and institutional responsibilities,” presidential legal advisor Roberto Zacapa said in the statement.

The more than 832,000-hectare (2 million-acre) reserve stretches across the departments of Gracias a Dios, Colón and Olancho, and includes numerous Indigenous Miskito, Pech and Garífuna communities. In 1982, a section of it was designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The reserve’s remote location along the Nicaraguan border has made it vulnerable to deforestation, drug trafficking, cattle ranching, gold mining, wildlife trafficking, roadbuilding and other illegal activities.

At least 6,691 hectares (16,533 acres) of forest were cut down between 2023 and 2025, according to the Forest Conservation Institute (ICF), the agency managing the country’s forests.

Since 2011, the reserve has been on UNESCO’s List of World Heritage in Danger, a list of sites facing serious threats to their environmental or cultural heritage.

“It’s like the wild west, where there’s no law and people come in and do whatever they want, and the rights of Indigenous communities are violated,” Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) Honduras program director, Edgard Herrera Scott, told Mongabay.

WCS attended preliminary meetings about the emergency. It wasn’t shown the final version.

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