The Chilean government has stressed the need to reform the regulations governing the forestry industry in the wake of the fires that are ravaging the south of the country, after some voices have attributed some responsibility to these companies for their monoculture plantations.
The Chilean president, Gabriel Boric, has announced a discussion to provide solutions to the fires «in the long term», pointing out that the private and public sectors must work together because the climatic conditions «will be increasingly adverse», reported ‘El Mercurio’.
«We have to generate everything in our power to prevent and reduce the level of risk, and in that, the private and public sectors have to work together,» Boric reiterated from Ñuble, one of the regions affected by the fires.
In fact, some concrete measures have already been put on the table within the Chilean Executive, such as the imposition of ‘royalties’ so that companies that exploit or extract natural resources must pay a canon to the State.
«What are we waiting for? We know what we have to do. We have to ask for a ‘royalty’ for forestry companies. And this ‘royalty’ must have funds, with short, medium and long term measures», said the Minister of Agriculture, Esteban Valenzuela, in declarations reported by the aforementioned newspaper.
Thus, the Minister of Agriculture defended the idea of paying a royalty to the State while stressing the need for the forestry industry to «modernize» and, at the same time, to create an environmental evaluation system that submits plantations to evaluation and reduces the risk of fires.
In addition, Valenzuela pointed out other measures necessary to prevent fires, such as a greater distance between forest plantations and cities, the creation of more roads, or greater control over irregular settlements or building permits.
Source: (EUROPA PRESS)
