Asia, Pacific Managua, Nicaragua - The coronavirus pandemic has paralyzed the global economy, unleashing what is easily the worst crisis since the Great Recession of 2008, if not since the Great Depression of 1929. Richard Condit, from the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, believes that the project could be used as leverage for forest protection in a country that currently lacks "institutional capacity" to meet conservation needs. The management offices would be rented or purchased near Rivas. Appropriate road improvements were planned. A fish processing plant was built, and while it initially brought in huge amounts of money, the projects ran dry after the shark population was, Local specialist Salvador Montenegro confirms this, telling, , “Although scientists such as Ignacio Astorqui and others initially thought that the Lake Nicaragua sharks was a separate species, recent studies have shown that they are in fact bull sharks. Its rich network of rivers and estuaries are home to dozens of species of birds and endangered animals. There would be significant impacts likely on Lake Nicaragua. He currently sits as the representative of Developing Country Parties from the Latin American and the Caribbean States on the fund as a board member. The Nicaragua Lake section measures 106.8 km (66.4 mi) and runs from 4 km (2.5 mi) south of San Jorge to 8 km (5.0 mi) south of San Miguelito. The company has not given any recent public comments and its website is currently, Oquist has also been Nicaragua’s chief climate negotiator and in February 2018, he was named, shortly after it reversed its opposition to joining the Paris climate accord. Local specialist Salvador Montenegro confirms this, telling The Diplomat, “Although scientists such as Ignacio Astorqui and others initially thought that the Lake Nicaragua sharks was a separate species, recent studies have shown that they are in fact bull sharks. "[49], Following financial difficulties, HKND finally closed its headquarters offices in China in April 2018, leaving no forwarding address or telephone numbers to be reached. Hundreds of cormorants in the San Miguelito wetlands on Lake Nicaragua. Nicholas Muller is a contributing writer and photojournalist to The Diplomat. There would be significant impacts likely on Lake Nicaragua, affecting 93,800 hectares of terrestrial ecosystems and 18,800 hectares of tropical rainforest in the Mesoamerican Biological Corridor, as well as the displacement of over 30,000 people,” says Huete-Pérez. At any rate, that is an irreparable loss of natural assets which provides incalculable eco-systemic services.”, “In regards to the displacement, they [Humboldt] also estimate that around 120,000 people would be displaced, but the entire population of the 10 municipalities affected is approximately 300,000 people.”. JUIGALPA, Nicaragua -- Under the blue and white flag of Nicaragua and homemade banners accusing the president of selling out the country, some 10,000 campesinos marched against the Sandinista government’s efforts to expropriate land to make way for a $50 billion private Chinese canal project. [42] There are indications of local opposition to intended expropriations. Other problems include the possibility of dredging bringing up toxic sediments, the disruption of migration patterns of animal species, and the potential to introduce invasive species to the Lake. We were not consulted about the project and the government didn’t know how to explain what benefit the Rama would get from this development.”. A hydropower facility would be built at the dam and would have generated over 10 megawatts of power to be used for Camilo Lock operations. Photo by Nicholas Muller. HKND described the project as the largest civil earth-moving operation in history. [67] No "major works" such as dredging were planned to take place until after a Pacific Ocean wharf was built. ... has been canceled since the explosion. Construction of a canal using the San Juan River as an access route to Lake Nicaragua was first proposed in the early colonial era. Ground was officially broken in December 2014 on the canal, which was slated to be roughly three times longer than the Panama Canal. ", "Chinese firm to develop US20bn Panama Canal alternative in Honduras", "SICE: Novedades en materia de política comercial: Centroamérica - México", Federal Republic of Central America (1823–1838), https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Nicaragua_Canal&oldid=1002393933, Proposed buildings and structures in North America, Articles containing Spanish-language text, Articles with unsourced statements from December 2020, Articles with unsourced statements from April 2019, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, This page was last edited on 24 January 2021, at 06:02. Taiwan is working to contain a domestic outbreak and maintain its remarkable success in containing the coronavirus. based on the final information provided by the study conducted by British firm ERM, and the Chinese company in their latest study. Nicaragua Canal Project (2014) (blue line). [81], Following financial difficulties, HKND finally closed its Headquarter offices in China in April 2018, leaving no forwarding address or telephone numbers to be reached. HKND estimates that about 50,000 people would be employed during the five-year construction, about half of them from Nicaragua, 25% from China, and the remainder from various other countries. the Chinese company said they would offer “fair market value” for properties. [20] Despite HKND vanishing, the Nicaraguan government indicates that it will go ahead with the 908 km2 dry land expropriations anywhere within Nicaragua, under land expropriation Canal Law 840. "[35] Under the exclusive contract, Wang can skip building the canal (and making any payments to Nicaragua) and instead simply operate lucrative tax-free side projects. Travelers who expected to board the cruise line’s Caribbean Princess on Wednesday for a 10-day voyage to the Panama Canal have been notified that their cruise was canceled. [93], As the original Panama Canal still has capacity for Panamax-sized shipping and Panama has completed its Panama Canal expansion project, adding more capacity and allowing transit for even larger New Panamax size ships, projections for the Nicaragua Canal's traffic may be optimistic. It is unclear today where Wang lives or what the state of his finances are. Stratfor indicated that after 10 years, ownership shares would periodically be handed over to Nicaragua, so that after 50 years Nicaragua would be the majority shareholder. Panama Canal Third Locks 1939-1942. But in October of 2015, the prospects for financing the canal began to dwindle when it became public that Wang had lost 85 percent of his fortune due to a massive downturn in his Xinwei-owned shares, Bloomberg reported. The emergence of a much more contagious variant of COVID-19 comes as Australia rolls out vaccines. The proposed canal would be between 230 meters and 520 meters (754.6 feet and 1,706 feet) wide and 27.6 metres (91 ft) deep. The Pacific port would be named Brito Port and the Caribbean one Aguila Port. [7][8][24] HKND Group is a private enterprise. Two fisherman out on their small boat in the middle of Lake Nicaragua. They then. The impact of canal construction on the environment has been the subject of intense debate in Nicaragua. The Nicaraguan government continues to allocate a budget for the canal authority. on three Nicaraguan entities. 39 Brief Fact Summary. [28][74] Wang lost nearly 85% of his wealth during the 2015 Chinese stock market crash, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. “The path of the canal would have split the lake in half, blocking fish coming from the San Juan River and entering into Lake Nicaragua,” Flores said. [84], President Daniel Ortega stated that he is "not concerned about harming the lake because it is already contaminated. In addition, the channel entrance on sea would have been be marked on both sides with a large sailing buoy about 3 kilometres (2 mi) offshore and 2 light buoys would mark the passage through Lake Nicaragua. The agreement was for HKND, then based in Hong Kong, to construct and operate the Nicaragua canal for the first 50 years, and have the ability to renew the contract for another 50. Now, people living in the proposed canal’s path face the uncertainty of whether they will be able to keep their land or will still be required to cede it. A frequently proposed, frequently cancelled plan to build a 100km canal between the Gulf of Thailand and the Andaman Sea is back on the Thai government’s radar, after a fashion. The announcement comes as confirmed COVID-19 infections continue to spike across the archipelago. The proposed route directly bisects numerous government protected areas (, of biodiversity including the Solentiname Archipelago, the Cerro Silva Natural Reserve, and the Río and San Juan Biosphere Reserves. The canal megaproject of Daniel Ortega and Wang Jing arrives to a key date in its null existence. Its director has said it is the only laboratory in the region that produces the reactive agents for the serological diagnosis of dengue and was the only molecular biology laboratory in Latin America able to diagnose influenza types accurately in 2019. Environmentalists have deemed there would be widespread and irreparable destruction to the island, Lake Nicaragua, and its connected ecosystems should the canal be built. “It’s a good time for them to join.”. However, Carlos Fernando Chamorro, editor of the Confidencial newspaper, said "If the People's Republic of China does not step forward, it won't happen. [28] The Nicaraguan government has not issued any further comments about the status of the project. “To me this clearly shows the disregard that these officials have shown and continue to show for the environment,” says Huete-Pérez. The contract established that it must be dissolve in 72 months, if the investor has not obtained the money to start the project, and the Chinese entrepreneur has not succeeded in getting the 50 billion dollars he promised for the work. The country is already considered one of the most. As locks generally define the limit on the size of ships that can be handled, the Nicaragua Canal would have allowed passage for larger ships than those that pass through the Panama Canal. [65] The canal as planned would have been 259.4 kilometres (161.2 mi) and would have three sections. Sanchez says he fears communities like his would have met a similar fate if the construction of the canal were to proceed: Short-term economic gains but irreparable damage to the environment that would leave them with little to show for the project in the long term. Oquist has also been Nicaragua’s chief climate negotiator and in February 2018, he was named co-chair of the Green Climate Fund shortly after it reversed its opposition to joining the Paris climate accord. Asia, Asia Despite the operation of the Panama Canal, which opened in 1914, interest in a Nicaragua canal has continued. Has it locked new President Biden into a needlessly hostile policy? The preconstruction phase included getting permits, acquiring land and machinery, and finalizing designs and plans. Existing port facilities at Corinto and Bluefields would have been improved to allow for shipment of material to the entry ports under construction. Further, a coast-to-coast railway line may be built by China in Honduras and could affect utilization of the Nicaragua Canal. Wang Jing of HKND Group gives a thumbs up at the inauguration of the construction of an inter-oceanic canal in Tola, Nicaragua, on Dec. 22, 2014. With its first homegrown vaccine approved for general use, China aims to vaccinate 50 million people by the Lunar New Year in February. Flores said he and others in Obrajuelo were offered a meager $250 for each hectare of land, not including their houses. 1984 I.C.J. The Nicaraguan Academy of Sciences noted that hundreds of thousands of hectares of pristine forests and wetlands would be destroyed and pointed out that the environmental study performed for the canal was not independent. The estimate for the workforce in 2020 was 3,700 people, and 12,700 in 2050 when traffic had increased. The company’s registered address is an accounting office in Kowloon. Huete-Pérez says the Humboldt Center and other environmental groups have put the estimate even higher. [55] Activists noted that the canal contract established that it must be dissolved in 72 months, if the investor has not obtained the money to start the project; that deadline was 14 June 2019, so they assert that the Law 840 must be repealed.[56]. Photo by Nicholas Muller. [37][96] Also, North American land bridges in Mexico and the United States will compete in the traffic between Asia and the U.S. east coast. Steps were promised to protect the environment during the construction process, but environmental groups say it’s not enough. Nicaragua and Costa Rica have stationed security forces at Harbor Head (also called Isla Calero) at the eastern end of the San Juan River. Following financial difficulties, HKND finally closed its offices in April 2018, leaving no forwarding address or telephone numbers to be reached. This reservoir would have had a surface area of 48.5 km2 and hold 1,100 gigalitres. The idea of constructing a man-made waterway through Central America has been thought about throughout history. [37] Wang Jing does not have the reputation to push this through. Panama is in a much better financial situation than Nicaragua to afford taking on such debt and already has a stream of income from its existing canals. Ometepe’s protected reserve is blessed with several ecosystems comprised of wetlands, tropical rainforests, and fog forests which possess the highest conservation value in all of Nicaragua. The, between the Nicaraguan government and the canal’s financial backer, Chinese billionaire Wang Jing, is. Ortega’s surprise announcement last week suggests the canal project remains alive, and has not been cancelled. [61], Investor Wang had financial setbacks unrelated to the Nicaragua project, losing 80% of his net worth during the 2015–16 Chinese stock market turbulence. The company’s registered address is an accounting office in Kowloon. [43], The Moscow Times reported in 2014 that Russia was willing to help build the Nicaragua Canal, viewing the project in part as an opportunity to pursue strategic interests in the region. in Ukraine and in several other projects he has been involved with around the world. During the construction phase from September 2015 to March 2020, the canal would have been dug and the locks built along with accompanying infrastructure. [66], No significant construction took place. Two concrete plants and a steel plant were planned to support the project. The Nicaraguan Canal (Spanish: Canal de Nicaragua), formally the Nicaraguan Canal and Development Project (also referred to as the Nicaragua Grand Canal, or the Grand Interoceanic Canal) was a proposed shipping route through Nicaragua to connect the Caribbean Sea (and therefore the Atlantic Ocean) with the Pacific Ocean. Scientists were concerned about the project's environmental impact, as Lake Nicaragua is Central America's key freshwater reservoir[4] while the project's viability was questioned by shipping experts and engineers.[5]. Six decades away from the opening of the Panama Canal, Nicaragua was an important part of the New York-to-San Francisco pipeline. It was estimated that each lock would have used about 9 megawatts of power. Nicaragua is one of the few countries in the region with a laboratory of molecular biology approved by the World Health Organization. Scientists were concerned about the project's environmental impact, as Lake Nicaraguais Central America's key freshwater reservoir while the project's viability was questioned by shipping exper… [86] 400,000 hectares of tropical rain forest and wetlands would be destroyed. September 12, but construction hasn’t begun. Both ports would get public road connections. Workers would live in one of nine camps, which besides food and shelter would also provide health care and security. Photo by Nicholas Muller. Flores said Chinese workers came to his house on the lake shore to do initial surveying and informed his family that the land would be used in the canal’s construction. One of FSD's support sites is located at Tola, which is within close proximity of the proposed Brito–Pacific canal opening. [59] The CIDH, Nicaragua's Human Rights Commission, has strongly criticized the government for not looking into the project's effect on citizens, amid claims that citizens were not involved in decision-making. A policy known as Law 840 was passed that allowed for the expropriation of properties that were deemed necessary to the canal’s construction, sparking protests from citizens who want to see the law repealed. Emailed response by Huete-Pérez, he says there was very little information about the status of the project has,. 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