According to the Mexican organization CONANP (National Commission for Protected Natural Areas), Protected Natural Areas are areas where the original environments have not been significantly altered by human activity or that require preservation and restoration. They are created by presidential decree and the activities that can be carried out within them are established in accordance with the General Law of Ecological Balance and Environmental Protection.
Today in Mexico there are 176 Protected Natural Areas administered by CONANP, which protect 25 million 394 thousand 779 hectares, which in turn represent 12.93% of the country’s surface. Within the 161 federal ANPs, 121 are located in terrestrial ecosystems and 61 have international designation or recognition.
This country is one of the five most diverse in the world. In this nation there are 96 ecoregions but 11 of them are not recognized in the ANP, according to data from the National Commission for the Knowledge and Use of Biodiversity. The latter body has also pointed out that Protected Natural Areas, especially those decreed at the end of the 19th century and the first 70 years of the 20th century, were chosen for their scenic beauty and not so much for a strategic preservation of multidiversity.
In Mexico there are federal, state, municipal and private ANPs. This means that very different authorities can make changes in land use, which greatly threatens them.
PNA Division
Protected Natural Areas in Mexico are divided into three seven types (in the links you can learn about their ecosystems and location):
Biosphere Reserves (41), National Parks (67), Natural Monuments (5), Natural Resources Protection Areas (8), Flora and Fauna Protection Areas (37) and Natural Sanctuaries (18).
General Location of Protected Natural Areas
As we mentioned before, in Mexico there are 176 Protected Natural Areas, but many of them are located by region, that is, on the same area. In that same space there can be several protection catalogs.
The zones with different nomenclatures of Protected Natural Areas are nine regions in total. The most extensive ANP regions are located in the Gulf of California in the North of the country and the Volcanic Axis region, which is a chain of volcanic mountains that crosses Nayarit, Jalisco, Colima, Michoacán, Guanajuato, Querétaro, Mexico City , Hidalgo, Morelos, Tlaxcala, Puebla and Veracruz, in the Los Tuxtlas region, from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico.
Here are the nine zones of Protected Natural Areas:
Baja California Peninsula and North Pacific (more than 900 islands with incredible landscapes of blue sea, in contrast to the desert)
Flora and Fauna Protection Area of the Gulf of California Islands
Valle de los Cirios Flora and Fauna Protection Area
San Lorenzo Archipelago National Park
Loreto Bay National Park
Bahía de los Ángeles Biosphere Reserve, Ballenas and Salsipuedes channels
Espiritu Santo Archipelago National Park
Cabo Pulmo National Park
Guadalupe Island Biosphere Reserve
Northwest and Upper Gulf of California
El Pinacate and Gran Desierto de Altar Biosphere Reserve
San Pedro Mártir Island Biosphere Reserve
North and Eastern Sierra Madre
Cuatrociénegas Flora and Fauna Protection Area
Cumbres de Monterrey National Park
Santa Elena Canyon Flora and Fauna Protection Area
West and Central Pacific
Sierra de Manantlán Biosphere Reserve
Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve
Center and Neovolcanic Axis
Chichinautzin Biological Corridor Flora and Fauna Protection Area
Grutas de Cacahuamilpa National Park
Iztaccíhuatl-Popocatépetl National Park
Nevado de Toluca Flora and Fauna Protection Area
Sierra Gorda Biosphere Reserve
Tehuacán-Cuicatlán Biosphere Reserve
Coastal plain and Gulf of Mexico
Protected Areas of the Gulf of Mexico
Southern border, isthmus and South Pacific
El Triunfo Biosphere Reserve
Yucatan Peninsula and Mexican Caribbean
Alacranes Reef National Park
Cozumel Reefs National Park
Tulum National Park
Domino Project
Calakmul Biosphere Reserve
Main threats to the Protected Natural Areas of Mexico
As we have mentioned before, the Natural Protected Areas in Mexico are divided into three sections: federal, state and municipal. The foregoing triggers an intense problem, because its care is subject to the decision of multiple actors; many of them reach their position for 3 years, as happens at the municipal level.
Protected Natural Areas face the dirt of corruption and many times land use change permits are granted, which gives rise to construction, deforestation, agriculture, mining. That is, it ends with the intended sense of “protection”.
In this way, the main threats to the ANPs are the overexploitation of resources, pollution, invasive species, climate change, drug cartels (which degrade the soil and deforest, in addition to threatening environmentalists), politicians corrupt, etc.
Another great drawback for the care of ANPs is that many are private property. Although it may seem incredible, many pieces of land that fit into this typology belong to individual individuals, ejidos, or community members. This means that the care of these areas involves numerous actors whose interests are not always friendly to the environment.
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Table made by the National Commission for the Knowledge and Use of Biodiversity in 2013
Examples of Protected Natural Areas (not protected)
In Huixquilucan, State of Mexico, there are three Protected Natural Areas decreed in this way since 1994: the ravines of the La Pastora river, the San Joaquín river and the La Loma river (also known as Barranca del Negro). These 129,000 hectares of municipal land, which should be cared for, are not. The ravines are approached by urban spots and even by road works.
Surely it has happened to you driving through a protected natural area and you wonder how you can be crossing it by car and why it is full of buildings.
To do?
There are social organizations such as Naturalia or Pronatura that have even bought large areas of land from individuals who owned land in ANP to take care of it. You can contact them and report your omissions to the ANP, or you can write or call those in charge of said areas.
If the ecological reality seems to make you desperate, remember that there is always someone who, like you, is outraged by corruption and irresponsibility. The important thing is to do small actions that add up to a chain. Locating ANPs from the collective culture is a great first step to monitor and protect them. Interest is a powerful door to the transformation of the environment.
Author’s Twitter: @anapauladelatd
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