Photos of the Rio Negro, one of the Amazon’s largest tributaries, now show giant swaths of mud where water once allowed ships to pull up to port in Manaus, Brazil. The rivers in Paraguay are low enough that the country has been forced to reduce soy exports by boat, and there are now conflicts over water usage between farmers and local fishers. In Bogota, Colombia, which usually averages over 220 days of precipitation and over 40 inches of rain per year, the drought is so serious that the local government has implemented water rationing. Ecuador’s government has been forced to implement nightly planned blackouts due to low water at hydropower plants and forest fires that have damaged the power grid. And temperatures in parts of Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile and Paraguay all set record highs during the Southern Hemisphere’s winter in recent months, leading to several serious forest fires that continue to burn.
South America is dry and aflame as the United Nations COP16 Biodiversity Summit meets in Cali, Colombia, this week. Just months after intense flooding in southern Brazil displaced a half-million people, the lack of water across that country and the continent as a whole is driving several political crises, including one that could disrupt the presidential election in Ecuador in just four months’ time. The fact that so many of Colombia’s neighbors face environmental emergencies will attract media attention and add greater urgency to a conference that might otherwise be ignored amid the many other political, economic and security challenges confronting the governments of the region.
As host, Colombian President Gustavo Petro is pushing bold proposals, including a plan to unite efforts on biodiversity and climate change that could be part of the agenda at the U.N. COP30 Climate Change Conference in Belem, Brazil, next year. He is adding a human rights agenda to the biodiversity conference that goes beyond traditional environmental concerns, stressing that issues of equity and justice—particularly for indigenous and other marginalized communities—must be part of any climate solution. He is also pushing forward with debt-for-nature swaps, whereby banks and international financial institutions reduce debt burdens in exchange for social goods, that are popular among Latin American and Caribbean governments.