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El Salvador Environmental Issues

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El Salvador, the smallest country in Central America has become the first country in the world to ban metal mining after a series of disputes with a Canadian-Australian company over the environmental aspects of the gold project. The country also has a partial ban in elements, such as the cyanide. The gold project was established between the company mentioned earlier and El Salvador. This project was supposed to bring economic benefits for the country. It is important to recall that metal mining has been one of the biggest sources of the income of the country since the 1990s after its civil war. Moreover, El Salvador is facing external debts and does not have many sources to pay it back. Hence, the gold project was seen as a crucial source of income. However, El Salvador has terminated this project because it was going to do a lot of environmental damages. A group composed of officials, lobbyists, academics and the church were united for the bill passed in the country against gold mining. The draft law against mining passed with 69 votes in favor, even though only 43 ballots were required for the bill to be passed. El Salvador fought a suit against the by Pac Rim Cayman, which was the company in charge of the gold project. After the dispute, the ICSID (International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes) has mandated this company to pay El Salvador 8 million plus interests. None of the members of the Canadian-Australian …show more content…

Can El Salvador find ways in the future to ameliorate metal mining without causing environmental damages? What would you say was the reaction of many Salvadorians that relied on metal mining as a source of income? After discussed mining and its pro and contra this semester, what would you said were the cost of banning metal mining in El Salvador? Were the arguments provided to prohibit this activity strong

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