Costa Rica has always been a brother country of Colombia, a great ally, and today more than ever in all environmental and sustainability policies, said Carlos Eduardo Correa, Minister of Environment and Sustainable Development of Colombia.
The Marine Corridor of the Eastern Tropical Pacific, the 30×30 Alliance that seeks to protect 30% of marine and terrestrial areas by 2030, the goal of Carbon Neutrality by 2050 and the promotion of green hydrogen are part of the common objectives that Costa Rica and Colombia in environmental matters.
For this reason, Colombia signed the Climate Action Law in December of the previous year, which becomes the roadmap for the South American country to achieve its environmental goals such as Carbon Neutrality and Zero Deforestation.
This was ratified by Carlos Eduardo Correa, Minister of the Environment and Sustainable Development of Colombia, after his participation in the “Forum of Ministers of the Environment of Latin America and the Caribbean”, held in Costa Rica.
In an, Correa highlighted the joint projects between both nations and also highlighted the environmental leadership that Costa Rica has been taking at the international level.
What is one of the common goals you have with Costa Rica?
One of the goals we have is to reach zero deforestation by 2030 and this fight against deforestation has important components that Costa Rica has been working on for a long time, such as payment for environmental services, conservation contracts, environmental education and green businesses; among others, nature tourism, which Costa Rica has had an important development for more than 20 years working on these issues.
I believe that here we must learn from the good practices that Costa Rica has been working on for more than 30 years in the sustainable management of forests, in the use of its biodiversity, in the management of the Protected Areas of the National Parks, in the entire implementation of payment for environmental services.
How is the joint protection of marine areas progressing?
Here comes a very important component that is the Pacific Corridor that we are working on with Ecuador, Panama and Costa Rica.A few days ago the declaration of Galapagos was made in Ecuador and in the month of April we will be making the declaration of the Protected Area of Malpelo and Yuruparí, which is the one that unites that Great Pacific Corridor.
This corridor will be one of the largest protected areas in the world, it is home to enormous biodiversity and this has drawn the attention of countries at a global level, of non-profit organizations, of the private sector that is very interested in making contributions for the management of this area.
Colombia has made significant progress in terms of sustainable mobility. What factors should Costa Rica consider to advance faster on this issue?
The cost of the technologies is still quite high and sometimes the financial closings of these projects are difficult, but the technology is advancing rapidly and it will make these closings easier.
It is necessary to reduce the costs of energy storage and also a very large commitment from the financial sector to be able to support and allocate resources for these decarbonization initiatives.
What was your participation in the Forum?
In the panel, I made a call to action, on how we are going to make these commitments that we have today at a global level and at a national level in each of our countries happen, so that they do not remain just commitments, but actions. .
Can we expect greater bilateral cooperation between Costa Rica and Colombia on environmental issues in the future?
Between Costa Rica and Colombia we will be working on many more sustainability and environmental issues, since the two countries have important leadership on these issues, so from now on we will be strengthening our cooperative relations so that these commitments can lead to the action that we wait.
