Ecuador tries novel balance of oil and environment

EL COCA, Ecuador (Reuters) – Under pressure to preserve the environment while at the same time ease the poverty of his people, Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa has come up with an unusual solution.

Correa wants wealthy nations to pay Ecuador $350 million a year in exchange for leaving an estimated 1 billion barrels of oil under the ground in the pristine Yasuni rainforest.

“I think oil has brought us more bad than good,” said Correa during a recent visit to the bustling Amazonian oil town of El Coca. “We need to do something about it.”

Environmentalists around the world have celebrated the idea, apparently the first of its kind, as a way to preserve a delicate environment without creating an economic burden for the cash-strapped nation where six in ten people are poor.

Reuters