Albert M. Chan-Dzul
This article was written in Spanish. Read the original article here. // Este artículo fue escrito en español. Lea el artículo original aquí.
In 2000, the National Action Party (PAN) won the presidency in Mexico. Even though everyone knew that as a right-wing party, the capitalist-extractivist development model would continue, the celebration of the departure from the government of the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), which by then had been in government for more than 70 years, could not be avoided.
During this first presidential term of “change”, two opposing projects were launched, but which in the speech were said to be complementary: the Mesoamerican Biological Corridor (CBM) with the objective of conservation, sustainable use of biodiversity and connection between the protected areas of the countries involved and, secondly, the Puebla Panama Plan with industrial development objectives (transoceanic connection, gas pipelines, superhighways, etc.).
At this time I was collaborating with communities around the Calakmul Biosphere Reserve (RBC), one of the most important protected areas in the Mayan jungle, an important part of the current Selva Maya Biocultural Corridor, a priority for the CBM. Some civil society organisations asked: What was the relationship between these two projects? While there was talk of conservation and the designation of Calakmul as a Mixed Heritage Site by UNESCO, Federal Highway 186 was also widened from 7 to 12 meters wide, politicians from different parties bought ejido lands (communal lands), there was talk of linking Calakmul with Tikal in Guatemala, a substation of the Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) was installed and its power lines were installed. The road and power lines accentuated the fragmentation of the RBC.
After the “illusion of change”, the PRI returned to power in 2012, thanks to the collusion between the PRI and the PAN, at this time already known as the PRIAN. The excitement of the Puebla Panama Plan, like the Mesoamerican Biological Corridor, faded away, but the idea of development and exploitation of nature remained. In 2016, the Sustainability Agreement for the Yucatan Peninsula was announced, now at the more local level, within the framework of COP13 in Cancun, while this Agreement was announced with goals such as “achieving that 50% of the terrestrial and coastal territory of the Yucatan Peninsula is under conservation and/or forest management schemes”. For his part, the president at the time, Enrique Peña Nieto, declared the Mexican Caribbean Biosphere Reserve as an example of conservation to achieve Aichi Goal 111; while the Mayan communities fought to prevent the planting of genetically modified corn and soybeans by suing the state for the installation of wind and photovoltaic farms in communal territories. In addition, while all this was happening, the industrialization plan through the Special Economic Zones was maintained, which under the argument of promoting development and generating jobs actually sought to benefit the business sector in areas with abundant resources, such as water, and cheap labor of peasants, mainly indigenous.
In 2018, the illusion returns. This time under the shelter of “hope”: Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) wins the presidency with the shelter of his National Regeneration Movement (MORENA) party. The degradation of words with a deeper meaning is a most “PRI” practice (in reference to the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), in government until the year 2000); let us remember the use of “solidarity” in the times of Carlos Salinas de Gortari. That’s right, from the so-called new Mexican left, old PRI members won the elections for the presidency of Mexico. Even those of us who did not believe in the speeches, thought that it was an opportunity to prevent the continuity of the PRI or the return of the PAN and that we would have 6 years with a “left” government to strengthen ourselves as communities or civil society movements.
No longer as Plan Puebla Panama, but the neoliberal objective and dream of industrializing the south-southeast began to materialize faster. With more experience, now the discourse was “the poor first” and the Sembrando Vida program was launched, which according to the World Resources Institute (WRI), until 2019 had been the cause of the deforestation of more than 73 thousand hectares. Worse still, the construction of the Mayan Train began, crossing 20 nature reserves and territories of indigenous peoples, with rigged consultations that did not comply with international human rights standards according to the Office in Mexico of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).2 Built in sections, there was never an environmental impact statement for the entire project and section 5, which runs from Cancun to Tulum, did not have any version of an environmental impact statement.
Different civil society organizations and communities filed more than 50 injunctions, but it has been argued that the “public utility of the work, and that the social interest prevails over the private interest,” despite the potential impacts demonstrated; for example, the placement of more than 9,000 metal structures filled with concrete to raise the train tracks along 42km of fragile soils, widely documented.3
Photo credits: Carlos Delgado
In Section 7, the Mayan Train crosses the Calakmul Biosphere Reserve (RBC). In addition to the expansion of Federal Highway 186 and the power lines, mentioned above, the train track and the expansion of the López Mateos-Xpujil aqueduct are added. So, it is not true that there is a single Calakmul Biosphere Reserve because it is divided by all this infrastructure.
When CBR was declared in 1989, entire communities were relocated; others were dispersed as families into already established communities outside the protected area, and still others were reunited into a single new community. Most of the families were not consulted, the promises in exchange for relocation were not fulfilled and for a long time the discourse prevailed of the impossibility of modifying the zoning “errors” in which the RBC overlaps with other communities. However, the zoning was modified so that the army would build a hotel in the core area of the RBC, in addition, the same army bought the lands of an entire ejido (15 thousand ha), where they are building an eco-hotel and where it is planned to use (it is not specified for what) a total of 9300 ha.
On June 2, 2024, in the presidential elections, Dr. Claudia Sheinbaum (of the MORENA Party), the first woman president won, bringing a great commitment to imprint her own style of governing or to continue with the legacy of the outgoing president. In environmental matters, the decision is clear: to follow the model where “the territory and the communities are considered socially necessary as long as they support the eternal task of increasing the industrial and commodity world4” with the same discourse of the poor first and (surprise!) with a progressive environmentalist discourse, but in fact the threats to biodiversity and the rights of the indigenous peoples who inhabit these territories are maintained and escalate.
According to the NOSSA report “Taking care of what matters5: the budget for the care of the environment and natural areas in the PPEF 2025″, while the number of protected areas has increased, the budget allocation has fallen 81% in the last three government periods. In general, only 0.1 percent of GDP is allocated to environmental issues, leaving protected areas with only 10.2 pesos (0.5 USD) per protected hectare. It should not be overlooked that the advance of infrastructure megaprojects in the south-southeast of Mexico is taking place in a context of high vulnerability of peoples and communities, custodians of the territories. According to the “Report on the situation of environmental human rights defenders and communities in Mexico” in 2024, of the total number of reported attacks, 38% occurred in this region and 6 of these attacks were lethal. Of the total number of attacks, 66% were by the government.
While the president of Mexico and the presidents of Belize and Guatemala declare the Biocultural Corridor of the Great Mayan Jungle, the army is advancing in the construction of the Gateway to the Sea tourism megaproject, which contemplates crossing the Siaan Ka’an Biosphere Reserve, through a 54.6 km road, to reach the sea, in addition to planning docks, shops, a restaurant and an artificial beach in a mangrove area, recognized as a Ramsar site.
Despite the judicial suspension orders to stop the construction of sections 5 and 7 of the Maya Train, for non-compliance with environmental principles to guarantee the right to a healthy environment, not only were these sections concluded, but progress continues to be made, now with the freight train, a megaproject for the transport of goods to integrate the Yucatan Peninsula into the national supply chain and connect with the Interoceanic Train.
The plan to reach the Yucatan Peninsula is maintained by the Puerta al Sureste gas pipeline connecting Dos Bocas in Tabasco with Mérida and Valladolid in Yucatan and later to Cancun in Quintana Roo. The Puerta al Sureste gas pipeline, which connects Veracruz with Tabasco, is owned by TC Energy, a Canadian company, which intends to bring gas from fracking to Mexico and carried out this project in segments to avoid reporting the cumulative impacts, including the impact on very particular coral reefs and to hide Mexico’s failure to comply with its climate change mitigation commitments. Although the official discourse is the generation of employment and the availability of gas for the south-southeast region, in reality the fuel is aimed at “contributing to the development of strategic projects of the federal government: the Dos Bocas refinery, the Interoceanic Corridor and the Mayan Train” according to the official website of the National Electricity Commission (CFE), in addition to the Development Poles for Well-being.
The “Development Poles for Well-being” is a euphemism for the Special Economic Zones of PRI times. Regardless of the name, they are “territorial polygons where specific infrastructure, tax benefits and administrative facilities are concentrated to attract national and foreign investment” where water, energy, communication routes and security are also guaranteed. Everything that cannot be offered to the peoples. And the villages? We peoples are mentioned ad nauseam in all speeches and projects. We are the color, the folklore, the image, the exotic photo of the governments in turn, and in this government not only is not the exception, but it is using the symbols of our peoples6 to win popular support and thereby legitimize the actions that previous governments could not develop.
In the announcement of the declaration of the Biocultural Corridor of the Great Mayan Jungle, the importance of the jungle, the fauna, and the peoples was discussed. But there is also talk of exporting the Sembrando Vida program to Belize and Guatemala, there is talk of expanding the passage of the Mayan Train to Guatemala without taking into account the multiple evidences of present and future impacts documented by specialists. In this context, the president of Guatemala, Bernardo Arévalo, said that “The Mayan Train is not going to cross any existing reserve area,” something similar to when López Obrador said “we are not going to cut down a single tree.” At the same time, 55 communities, with more than 60,000 people, displaced to the Mayan Jungle in Petén, now live under criminalization with the risk of being evicted. Sustainable development and conservation, the discourse as a spearhead to open the way to big capital, was finally achieved… putting the peoples as “cannon fodder”.
Albert M. Chan-Dzul is an Indigenous Maya from Sanahcat, Yucatán, Mexico. He is a biologist specializing in agroecology and holds a master’s degree in tropical forest and biodiversity management and conservation. He is a co-founder of the Interdisciplinary Center for Research and Alternative Development, U Yich Lu’um, coordinator of the Mesoamerica subregion in the ICCA Consortium, and co-coordinator of the Latin American Group on Governance of Protected and Conserved Areas by Indigenous Peoples and Traditional and Local Communities.
Footnotes
- By 2020, at least 17% of land and inland water areas and 10% of coastal and marine areas… they will be preserved… Kothari, A. & A. Neumann, 2019. ICCA and Aichi Targets: the contribution of territories and areas conserved by indigenous peoples and local communities to the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011-20 (Aichi Targets). ICCA Consortium, Kalpavriksh. CENESTA and Savia Ed. Lima. ↩︎
- https://hchr.org.mx/comunicados/onu-dh-el-proceso-de-consulta-indigena-sobre-el-tren-maya-no-ha-cumplido-con-todos-los-estandares-internacionales-de-derechos-humanos-en-la-materia/ ↩︎
- https://www.proceso.com.mx/nacional/2023/11/2/calakmul-el-acueducto-inconcluso-de-la-sedena-439-millones-de-pesosporcomprobar-317823.html ↩︎
- The construction of a cargo branch is underway to “reinforce national logistics to move goods and allow the entire southeast of Mexico to have more development…” the federal government has declared.
Sandoval V. D. 2020. Mayan Train, sowing life and trans-isthmus corridor. Impacts on the territorial use value of indigenous and peasant communities. Ceccam.
https://obras.expansion.mx/infraestructura/2025/08/07/tren-maya-progreso-yucatan-base-expropiaciones-decreto ↩︎ - NOSSA. Northwest Civil Society for Environmental Sustainability
PPEF. Draft Expenditure Budget of the Federation ↩︎ - Aguilar G. Y. 2025. The SCJN and its “traditional” ceremony: Tizoc effect. Maxän. El País. Available in: https://elpais.com/mexico/opinion/2025-08-30/la-scjn-y-su-ceremonia-tradicional-efecto-tizoc-maxan.html ↩︎