El Salvador overturns metals mining ban, defying environmental groups

El Salvador’s legislature has overturned a seven-year-old ban on metals mining, a move that the country’s authoritarian president, Nayib Bukele, had pushed for to boost economic growth, but that environmental groups had opposed.

El Salvador became the first country in the world to ban all forms of metals mining in 2017. Bukele, who took office in 2019, has called the ban absurd.

All 57 of Bukele’s allies in the Central American country’s 60-seat legislature voted for the president’s legislation to overturn the ban.

The legislation will grant the Salvadorian government sole authority over mining activities within the country’s land and maritime territory.

“By creating a law that puts the state at the center, we are guaranteeing that the population’s wellbeing will be at the center of decision making,” the lawmaker Elisa Rosales, from Bukele’s New Ideas party, said in a speech to the legislature.

The legislation does prohibit the use of mercury in mining, and seeks to declare some areas incompatible with metals mining as protected nature reserves.

El Salvador’s economy is expected to grow 3% this year, according to the International Monetary Fund, but it has a heavy debt burden that hit a level of about 85% of gross domestic product earlier this year.

Bukele, who enjoys wide popularity among voters after a sweeping gang crackdown, has touted mining’s economic potential for the country of roughly 6 million people.

By locking up more than 1% of the population, Bukele has turned one of Latin America’s most violent countries into one of its safest – but human rights organisations have documented arbitrary arrests, enforced disappearances, torture and massive violations of due process.

The president shared on social media last month that studies conducted in just 4% of Salvadorian territory where mining is possible had identified gold deposits worth some $132bn, equivalent to about 380% of El Salvador’s gross domestic product.

“This wealth, given by God, can be harnessed responsibly to bring unprecedented economic and social development to our people,” Bukele wrote at the time.

Dozens of people protested on Monday near Congress against the reauthorization of mining, arguing that future projects could affect the communities and ecosystem of the smallest country in Central America.

“We oppose metals mining because it has been technically and scientifically proven that mining is not viable in the country,” the environmentalist Luis González told reporters.

“The level of contamination that would be generated in the water, soil and biodiversity is unacceptable for life as we know it.”