https://impresa.prensa.com/panorama/Darien-diputados-crean-comision-investigar_0_5382961664.html

The plenary session of the National Assembly yesterday approved the formation of a commission that will be in charge of investigating the problem of deforestation in Darien.

• info
  Darien loses 8.1 hectares per day
  The above, after that in the last 7 years that province has lost 20 thousand 800 hectares of valuable forest, at a rate of 8.1 hectares per day, according to a 2019 report, prepared by the new Department of Tele Detection, created by the Ministry of Environment to calculate the rate of deforestation in the country.

20,800 are the hectares of forest that have been lost in Darien in 7 years. 8.1 are the hectares lost per day in the province. 52 are fines imposed for logging and fires between 2014 and 2018.

The commission consists of Deputies Edison Broce and Juan Diego Vásquez, independent; Cenobia Vargas and Alina González, of the Democratic Revolutionary Party; Arnulfo Díaz, of Democratic Change; Corina Cano, from Molirena; and Itzi Atencio, of the Panamanian Party.

According to Broce, what is happening in Darién with illegal logging, the fires and livestock without planning, which impact valuable forests, must lead to declare in this province a “national ecological emergency.”

The commission will have a term of 30 days to render a report of what was detected before the plenary session of the National Assembly. “We have deforested the equivalent of 20 thousand football stadiums, if we put it in terms for better understanding,” he said.

The Minister of Environment, Milciades Concepción , suspended for 100 days – from July 1 – the issuance of permits for logging in Darién, while conducting an audit of the guarantees granted by the past administration (between 2014 and 2018).

Despite this, environmental authorities continue to detect trucks and containers with wood, which did not have the transport guides in order. In fact, last August 11 carried out several wooden withholdings for this cause.