An Expert Gives His Opinion on the Eradication of the Water Lily

Published May 6, 2022

By Carola Rico

The engineer Arturo Morales Tirado, activist, former director of Municipal Environment and Ecology (22 years ago in the administration of Oscar Arroyo Delgado), and advisor on environmental issues for Atención San Miguel, granted an interview to talk about the proposals he has for the eradication and containment of the Water Lily infestation in the Allende Dam.

Morales began by explaining that this infestation is a result of the disorder and unsustainable model of our urban development, and is part of the contamination of the ecosystems of San Miguel.

According to Morales, the environmental challenges are not only for the municipality but for the world. The first challenge is the lack of demographic planning, that is, the doubling of the human population. In the case of San Miguel, it has increased more than twice per generation in the last 25 years, and there is no planning that can supply the needed services or meet the demands of a population when it reproduces this fast.

The second challenge is that we do not have a good management of natural resources and this is called economy. At this point, it is necessary to check that the regulations and legislation are complied with. The third challenge is ecology and ecosystems. We have exceeded  the capacity of our ecosystems and our environmental services are no longer sustainable because we have degraded and deteriorated them more and more.

The fourth challenge is demographics, we continue to grow as a society, but neither space nor resources are growing, so there is an imbalance. In addition, according to Morales, today we live longer, but in worse conditions, and there is a large population that lives marginally.

The fifth challenge is migration to our municipality––more and more people come to live in our city. In addition to higher growth, fertility rates are rising and becoming unsustainable. In other words, with all of the above we are not managing our natural or human resources.

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