For Immediate Release
August 20, 2024 – Today marks the first anniversary of one of the most significant victories for the global climate movement in the past decade. On August 20, 2023 millions of voters in the South American nation of Ecuador overwhelmingly voted to halt oil drilling in the Amazon’s Yasuni National Park, one of earth’s most biodiverse places. To date, the Ecuadorian government has failed to respect the people’s democratic will and to meet the 12-month deadline for state-run oil company Petroecuador to cease oil activities in Yasuní, close the wells, dismantle infrastructure, and restore the area.
The controversial Ishpingo-Tambococha-Tiputini (ITT) oil project located on the eastern edge of the Yasuni National Park currently produces more than 57,000 barrels of oil per day, approximately 12% of Ecuador’s oil production.
Similar to his predecessors, Ecuador’s President Daniel Noboa has promoted neoliberal policies favoring oil and mining interests since the beginning of his term, and has militarized the country as a response to the country’s deepening security and economic crisis. In January 2024, Noboa announced the need for a moratorium on the Yasuni sentence, alleging that a state of “internal armed conflict” justified the need to continue drilling for oil. In a move to take further control, Noboa issued an executive decree to establish a committee to oversee the implementation of the referendum and the decommissioning of the oil concession in May 2024. However, the decree fails to deliver a clear action plan for the exit of the oil industry in Yasuni, and excludes Indigenous participation from its committee.
As the climate crisis intensifies around the world and the Amazon rainforest rapidly approaches an irreversible tipping point, Ecuador’s non-compliance with the outcome of the Yasuni referendum further highlights the insufficient actions of many global governments to meet their climate commitments. It threatens pledges made by the government in the Paris Agreement and the goal of transitioning away from fossil fuels, agreed on by nearly 200 countries during the COP28 climate summit in Dubai last year.
The Yasuni victory was the first time that a country determined the limits of resource extraction through a referendum. The outcome demonstrates a shift in public opinion regarding the oil industry, which has caused consequential environmental and human rights damage across the Amazon region for over half a century. Located at the intersection of the Andes, the Amazon, and the Equator, the Yasuni National Park boasts more species of plants and animals than in the United States and Canada combined, many of which are native to the area. It is also home to two of the world’s last Indigenous communities living in voluntary isolation, whose survival is gravely threatened by the surrounding extractive activities and deforestation.
Despite being the first country in the world to enshrine the Rights of Nature into its Constitution, Ecuador continues to build on its alarming track record for disregarding legally binding sentences in landmark cases for rainforest protection, with Yasuni being one example among several. Other unresolved cases include the Waorani people of Pastaza and the Kichwa people of Sarayaku who won battles against oil drilling and the A’i Cofan of Sinangoe who triumphed against gold mining interests.
Ecuador’s Indigenous peoples and human rights and civil society organizations aligned with the movement have vowed to fight back against the compounding threats on their territories and rights. At the end of August, the political organization of the Waorani people will notably be holding a two-day event to organize strategies to defend and enforce the Yasuni victory.
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Indigenous leaders, activists and experts are available for interviews. High-resolution photography and video available upon request.
