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The Magdalena River Basin is an invaluable resource for the nation of Colombia that is an integral part of providing a full range of ecosystem services including supporting services, provisioning, regulating, and cultural as the river system has been known throughout the countries long history as the heart of the nation. As the most biodiverse country on the planet in relation to its size, Colombia itself is a rich natural landscape, with vibrant traditions, and the third largest economy in South America which utilizes the Magdalena River Basin as an important aspect of what has been termed the "bioeconomy".¹

Photo Credit: nature.org

[1] Canales, Nella, and Juanita Gómez González. Policy Dialogue on a Bioeconomy for Sustainable Development in Colombia. Report. Edited by Mash Andrew. Stockholm Environment Institute, 2020. 7-10.

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As an important access route from the Caribbean Sea through many of the key cities in Colombia the Magdalena River Basin has always shaped the development of the country. Currently, the 1528-kilometer river system supports the drinking water of some 38 million people, and 75% of the countries agricultural production.

Video Credit: nature.org

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Magdalena: Past, Present and Future of Colombia

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Forming at 3,685 meters above sea level in the Andes mountains the river descends from the Magdalena Lagoon from nearby Ecuador at the Southwest corner of Colombia through nearly the length of the country. It spans a variety of ecosystems from dense tropical forests, mountain ranges, and wetlands. Some 2735 animal species call this river system home, and a whole 20% of the worlds avian population which if you can imagine is part of why Colombia itself is such a biodiverse rich country.1

[1] Baumhardt, Alex. “The Magdalena and the ‘Master Plan.” Los Angeles Review of Books, 2015.

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This large, biodiverse, and vital resource to the Colombian nation, and the natural environment that the country is built within is not without a growing set of environmental concerns. Referencing the map below, you can see how much more of the Magdalena River Basin has been transformed into agricultural land between 1970-1990 and in the ensuing years, since Colombia has achieved a hard fought peace through negotiations with rebel groups, and dramatically reducing the violence of narco-trafficking, development has only increased at a more rapid pace.

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Colombia is also heavily dependent on hydropower with at least 70% of the countries electricity generated through hydroelectric dams, many of which are already placed along the Magdalena River. Dams along the Magdalena have in the past displaced, mostly poor, rural communities and workers as well as contributed to habitat loss, flooding, and the degradation of Colombia's wetlands.

Video Credit: Youtube User elvladyman

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With foreign investment eager to foster national development, the Magdalena River Basin has become the unfortunate site of illegal mining operations, a dumping grounds for industrial and agricultural waste, with Colombia's largest state-controlled oil refinery built along its banks.¹

Photo Credit: colombiareports.com

[1] Baumhardt, Alex. “The Magdalena and the ‘Master Plan.” Los Angeles Review of Books, 2015.

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Despite these challenges, the country is in the process of developing a, "Master Plan" for hydroelectric power into the future alongside the Chinese firm Hydrochina which envisions the Magdalena as a superhighway with a network of dams, power plants, and canals to support Colombia's energy, and shipping needs.¹

Photo Credit: Communicafe.com

[1]  Kraul, Chris. “Opponents of Planned Colombian Dams Take Heart from OAS Report,” November 8, 2014. https://www.latimes.com/world/mexico-americas/la-fg-colombia-dams-20141108-story.html.

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A Los Angeles Times article from 2014 as the project was still in earlier stages of development quotes a local architect in a region that would see intensive development as saying, "“A lot of the river would disappear as a living entity with this plan,” said Ricardo Baez... “If it changes the climate as some people think, coffee growers could be affected and so could the high-altitude ecosystem where the river originates".1

Photo Credit: thecitypaperbogata.com

[1]  Kraul, Chris. “Opponents of Planned Colombian Dams Take Heart from OAS Report,” November 8, 2014. https://www.latimes.com/world/mexico-americas/la-fg-colombia-dams-20141108-story.html.

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The strategic exploitation of natural resources to underscore development is a focal point of Colombian national policy. In a report for the Stockholm Environment Institute Canelles, and Gonzales emphasize the role of community in helping to shape an improved dialog between man an nature in which the importance of a healthy environment is considered a fundamental human need, alongside growth in agriculture, medicine, and other traditionally recognized essential aspects of wellbeing.¹

Photo Credit: Wade Davis

[1] Canales, Nella, and Juanita Gómez González. Policy Dialogue on a Bioeconomy for Sustainable Development in Colombia. Report. Edited by Mash Andrew. Stockholm Environment Institute, 2020. 7-10.

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Some are being left out of this process however and find themselves under threat of extinction to their way of life, or their existence itself.  For freshwater fishing industry that draws its value from the Magdalena River and its tributaries this couldn’t be more of an overstatement, and in Colombia’s rural communities the realities of an intrinsic relationship with a changing environment and food security are a daily lived experience. From a river Basin that once produced 80,000 metric tons of freshwater fish and supplied Colombia with 60% of all of its consumed fish in the 1970’s, the Magalena now has been reduced to producing merely 1/5th of those numbers and reduced the industry to such that it is becoming increasingly difficult to support fishing for a living wage.[1]

Photo Credit: Wade Davis

[1] Galvis, Germán, and José Iván Mojica. 2007. “The Magdalena River Fresh Water Fishes and Fisheries.” Aquatic Ecosystem Health & Management 10 (2): 127–39.

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Essential to this dying industry, has been the loss of fish themselves. A dramatic reduction in freshwater fish within the Magdalena River Basin has irreparably changed the biodiversity makeup in the rivers of the water system. While researching the shocking losses of species diversity in the river system Galvis and Mojica conclude that, “of the 44 species included in the Colombian red book of endangered freshwater fish species, 19 are from the Magdalena basin: two of them, the most important to fisheries, are in the category of critically endangered”. [1]

[1] Galvis, and Mojica. 2007. “The Magdalena River” 127-139.

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Fish stocks in the Magdalena River Basin face incredibly varying threats that would be difficult to address comprehensively without wide-sweeping action and a near complete ban on fishing for several years.1 Threats include overfishing, contaminants from sewage runoff in densely populated areas, mercury poisoning from gold mining operations along the river, and fish farming the product of which now represents more than half of all fish fish sold in Colombian markets.2

Photo Credit: Unknown

[1] [2] Galvis, and Mojica. 2007. “The Magdalena River” 127-139.

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As the people of Colombia recognize the Magdalena River Basin as having been inseperably important to it's history, growth, development as fisheries in the river a quickly becoming depleted aspects of its future remain uncertain.

Video Credit: The Nature Conservatory

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Unfortunately, fisheries, and fish species are not the only aspects of the Magdalena River Basin facing challenges. Research by Natalia Gallego-Garcia and Olga Castano Mora into the life cycles of Magdalena River Turtles discovered that  "all 6 species in the genus Podocnemis are regionally threatened".¹ Due to overhunting, habitat loss, and the harvesting of eggs their study discovered that regional fishing communities unanimously reported a discernable population decrease over time.

Photo Credit: Worldlandtrust.org

[1] Gallego-García, Natalia, and Olga Victoria Castaño-Mora. “Ecology and Status of the Magdalena River Turtle, Podocnemis Lewyana, a Colombian Endemic.” Chelonian Conservation & Biology 7, no. 1 (August 2008): 37–44. doi:10.2744/CCB-0643.1.

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Efforts to prevent the Magdalena River turtle, an endemic species to the region are focusing in some cases on educating rural villages about the turtle, and especially young students who will shape the future of the Colombian nation. Alongside those efforts, turtles are hatched, and released into the wild in attempts to boost numbers and slow the decline of the species in the wild.

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Releasing the Magdalena River Turtle : tourism and conservation in Colombia.

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I remains to be seen how exactly the fallout of the current pandemic will effect the Colombian economy, and infrastructure in the longer term although some adverse and lasting effects are expected. An already existent migrant crisis in which thousands of Venezuelans had been crossing the border to Colombia for months has grown into a more precarious situation due to border closures and the increasing fragility in Venezuela. This unfolding situation could potentially placing an unexpected strain on human and health services as well as increasing the number of people who rely on environmental services in the Magdalena River Basin for essential needs

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Right now, in Colombia there are over a million currently displaced persons from Venezuela who’ve been forced out of their country as a result of state fragility, violence, and the threat of starvation and hunger brought on by the crumbling economy. Colombia has largely welcomed the refugees, as still thousands are crossing the border daily a response that contrasts that of the United States, and other Central and South American countries who’ve placed restrictions specifically designed to stop the inflow of Venezuelan migrants like requiring passports to cross borders which many, especially the poorest among the refugees do not have.

Photo Credit: The BBC

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The impact of Covid-19 has only exacerbated the crisis. As a result of the pandemic Colombia was forced to close its borders creating even more hurdles for refugees now faced with the need to pay for access to illegal smuggling routes and human traffickers who often pose an additional safety hazard to the journey. As well, many along common routes who would have stopped to give out free rides are now wary due to the pandemic. Meanwhile, the situation in Venezuela deteriorates further necessitating that many take the risky journey or face starvation and destitution.

Photo Credit: BBC

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The potential for stresses related to an influx of migrants to Colombia’s environmental services is real, the Magdalena river basin is already straining under the pressures of providing the majority of Colombia’s hydroelectricity and drinking water with distinct shifts in flood patterns, and losses in biodiversity already present concerns.

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While opening a country’s borders to refugees may create challenges for the environment, the economy, and shift the ethnic makeup of a host country are real concerns. The certainty that closing a country’s borders to refugees will condemn many human lives to death, or destitution should be superseding concern.

A moral responsibility to alleviate the suffering of other humans in need should translate into economic support, refuge, and assistance in returning the lives of refugees back towards health, and safety. For displaced persons, and refugees achieving the full spectrum of human rights is a lofty goal often well beyond the immediacy of surviving the day, a transnational journey, or a year long wait in a refugee camp. The nature of this crisis as well crosses borders, moves beyond national identity, or regional affiliations, and becomes a human crisis that in some way touches us all and shapes the way our societies are ordered.

Photo Credit: bbc.com

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The future of the Colombian nation will depend heavily on the health of its environment, and the ability for healthily functioning ecosystem services to support a growing country. Aspirations towards development and growth are dependent on environmental constraints that in some cases cannot be engineered around with currently available technology.

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Indigenous women have been at the forefront of conservation efforts in Colombia leading the efforts to protect the environment, and indigenous lands from wanton, overreaching development efforts.

Video Credit: Conservation International

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Despite recognizing in theory  the need for a practice of developing that incorporates natural resources, into a framework that values biodiversity, and sustainability, in practice many communities are now under threat due to the exploitation of the Magdalena River Basin, both human and non-human.

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The Magdalena River Basin has been called the heart of the Colombian people, and the nation that they have built on many of the services that it provides. Just like any heart, its health will determine its longevity. While the Colombian government, and its people recognizes the importance of maintaining the health and biodiversity of the Magdalene River basin and has identified a strategic set of goals that adhere to forward thinking bioeconomic principles enforcing these principles within the context of a widely dispersed river basin with varying needs is proving a challenge.

Photo Credit. unknown

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Colombia is a nation with unlimited potential. It's future, the future of its peoples are intricately linked to the health of the Magdalena River Basin. Throughout the history of Colombia as a nation-state, and even long before then the Magdalena River Basin has been an important part of sustaining the lives of human beings, living in the region. In order to achieve that unlimited potential the nation, and its diverse populace will need to balance development with conservation in Magdalena River Basin to create a sustainable future.

Photo Credit: usaid.gov