Plans for Argentine Park Sound Environmental Alarm

When the government announced that it had granted a consortium a long-term contract to modernize facilities at Iguazu National Park, site of one of the world’s most spectacular waterfalls, environmentalists shuddered.

Over two decades, businessmen had proposed building noisy elevators, a huge chairlift, even a nocturnal lighting system at the park, whose falls are shared by Argentina and Brazil.

What did this group have in mind, they wondered.

Among the consortium’s proposals to update the Argentine side of the park was one to ferry tourists around the park in a train.

How could ferrying tourists around in a train be compatible with the falls in Iguazu National Park and their fragile jungle backdrop?

“The train isn’t as bad as it seems since fewer animals will be run over by buses and cars driving around the park,” said Liliana Cerruti of the Fundacion Vida Silvestre environmental group. “We’re basically in favor of it.”

The train, which will run on gas, will bring tourists from the entrance of the park to a catwalk leading to the Garganta del Diablo (Devil’s Throat), the waterfall with the largest volume of water. Construction is expected to begin soon.

The consortium won a 12-year contract to modernize facilities on the Argentine side with a $12-million investment.

It will take charge of tourist facilities such as restaurants and boat trips and plans to build an information center to inform tourists about the waterfalls and the surrounding jungle. Between 6,000 and 15,000 people visit the falls daily.

Argentine Environmental Secretary Maria Julia Alsogaray says the bidding is “good news” for the park since the state no longer will have to worry about tourist facilities.

“Now, park rangers can concentrate on the environment, as they’re supposed to, and not spend all their time pointing tourists in the right direction,” she said during a walk around the park.

She said the train would help control access to the park since other forms of transport will be banned.

Although ecologists are worried that the consortium may want to build a new hotel within the park in addition to two that already exist, they say the group’s guarantee that it will control tourist access is vital.

“Tourists here have to be supervised 24 hours per day,” said Cerruti, recalling how a ranger recently found a cook from a nearby hotel fishing near the falls. Several tourists also have been found hunting endangered animals at night.

Iguazu National Park is home to 440 species of birds, including toucans and a species of swift that darts in and out of the thundering water. There are also about 120 different species of trees and 76 different mammals.

On the Brazilian side of the falls, tourists can enjoy a stunning panoramic view. On the Argentine side, you get closer to the water, walking around and above dozens of falls.

But the threat from tourism to the park is by no means a thing of the past.

Every seven minutes, a helicopter full of tourists takes off from Brazil and roars overhead, startling birds and spewing exhaust fumes over the semitropical jungle as it burns about 100 liters of fuel per hour.

Although several thousand people have signed a petition in Argentina calling for a ban, there is no solution in sight, perhaps because the operators make about $2.5 million per year from the $50-per-head flights.

“We’ve made some progress since now there’s only one helicopter in the air at any one time,” said Cerruti. “Go back a few years and there were as many as eight at a time circling above the falls.”