Latin America is the Most Dangerous Region for Environmentalists 

October 18, 2021 CATALYST Team

In 2019, 212 land and environmental defenders were killed worldwide. Over two-thirds of these killings took place in Latin America.

The grave of Berta Caceres, a human rights defender and environmentalist in Honduras who was murdered after speaking out against a hydroelectric project. Trocaire. CC BY 2.0

Since the adoption of the Paris climate accord in December 2015, an average of four environmentalists have been killed each week. Each year, around 60% of these murders take place in Latin America. These killings span different economic and environmental sectors, from agribusiness to oil and gas, and are traced to different perpetrators, including organized crime groups, paramilitary groups, police and contract killers linked to businesses. Latin America has so far seen little government crackdown on unauthorized practices that harm the environment, like logging and deforestation, and governments have been unsuccessful in preventing these illegal businesses from coming into conflict with environmentalists.

Global Witness, an organization dedicated to exposing the connections between natural resources, conflict and corruption, releases an annual report on the killings of land and environmental defenders worldwide. Since Global Witness began this report in 2012, Latin America has consistently ranked as the most dangerous region for environmentalists.

In 2019, the number of murdered environmental defenders reached a new high of 212. Sixty-four of these deaths were in Colombia, making it the country with the most environmental defenders killed. Brazil, Mexico and Honduras ranked third, fourth and fifth for number of environmental defender deaths. According to the report, mining, agribusiness and logging were the deadliest sectors for environmental activists. All three are sectors that contribute heavily to industrial emissions and thus face strong criticism for their impact on the ever-worsening climate crisis.

The 2019 Global Witness report also found that, as in previous years, Indigenous activists face disproportionate risk. Forty percent of murdered environmentalists around the globe belong to Indigenous populations, despite these groups making up less than 5% of the world’s population. The risk to Indigenous environmental activists in Latin America is no different; many of Latin America’s environmental activists are members of the Indigenous population, like Berta Caceres, whose 2016 murder following her vocal opposition to a hydroelectric project sparked international outrage. In the first two months of 2020, at least 11 Indigenous activists were killed in Latin America.

The 2020 Global Witness report on environmental defender killings has not yet been released, but the Council on Foreign Relations reported in April 2020 that high-profile killings of environmentalists in Latin America had accelerated during the first half of the year. It is likely that the number of environmentalists killed in Latin America increased, and will continue to increase unless preventive actions are taken.

Recently, countries in Latin America and the Caribbean took steps toward protecting the rights of environmental activists through the Escazu Agreement, which entered into force on April 22, 2021. The agreement, which was first adopted in 2018, introduces specific provisions to defend the human rights of environmentalists. The agreement has now been adopted by 24 countries and ratified by 12, officially putting its new provisions into effect. The Escazu Agreement is only the start of a solution, however. Governments need to not only protect environmentalists, but to support their mission of defending ecosystems while preventing environmentally destructive projects.