Estero Salado Waterkeeper’s Efforts to Protect Waterway Arrives at COP 27
By: Daniel Ortega
Estero Salado Waterkeeper’s efforts to protect and restore the waters of the Estero Salado, the main saltwater estuary running through the city of Guayaquil, Ecuador is receiving increased attention.
As the post-COVID new reality of economic recovery has pushed the Estero Salado pollutions to its tipping point, a call for urgent action launched by Estero Salado Waterkeeper will be promoted at the major climate summit – COP27 – taking place at Egypt the next two weeks, where major global leader will meet to join forces to solve the most pressing global issue and stabilize increasing temperatures at no higher than 1.5° C.
Sustainability at the front page is an emerging prototype virtual community defined as an alternative to traditional media. It has recently partnered with Estero Salado Waterkeeper to get visibility within the local ecosystem and grow public awareness for the need for action.
This community of animated user-generated content about causes that address local sustainable challenges aims at helping organizations get support from businesses looking to meet their CSR and climate goals, while also reaching a relevant audience.
“Bringing local climate efforts to the front page” is an effort by this new virtual community that will present a practical way to accelerate climate adaptation in local ecosystems, through community-generated content during a side event at COP27.
According to Pilar Piana, founder of Ecohuellas, “Salado Waterkeeper responded to the call to mobilize the Guayaquil community, who were concerned about the state of the salty estuary and were willing to take action to change that reality.”.
Among other top global “causes” this effort aims to award the cause with the most content generated about it and present the winner as a real example of how society can accelerate climate adaptation in local ecosystems.
The side event is aimed at a youth audience committed to sustainable action, as well as high-level profiles from both the private sector and NGOs.
Although Estero Salado pollution is a sad reality, it seems that the pandemic has pushed this issue to the background or third place. To this we add that in countries like Ecuador, concern about the issue is relatively low compared to the rest of the world.
Concern about other social issues seems to have caused the attention on the Estero Salado pollution in Guayaquil to disappear, despite the fact that the majority of the global population thinks that the world’s poorest places are indeed experiencing the consequences of this ecosystem destruction.
Also in Ecuador, and for similar reasons, there are fewer campaigns on pro-environmental attitudes than before the pandemic, as can be seen on the billboards in our cities where they were previously displayed or on the pages that collect current campaigns or reports about them.
We hope that new platforms for engagement such as this can facilitate our efforts and show the citizens of Guayaquil that change is feasible if they commit to it.
Estero Salado Waterkeeper is able to do this kind of work and more thanks to the generous support of donors.