Africa-Press – Seychelles. “The protection of the environment is a matter of survival”
In its issue of this week released from the press in France, the prestigious French magazine Paris Match gave a large coverage to the fight of the Seychelles for the protection of the environment. The journalist of Paris Match, Romain Clergeat, who had made a trip to the Seychelles recently, gave no less than eight pages to the contributions of the Seychelles to preserve the environment and also published a long interview of the Head of State, the President Wavel Ramkalawan on this ‘green’ file.
The French journalist describes the President as a “resister of the Seychelles”, a man who lacks “neither faith nor perseverance” to denounce ecological drifts and to promote the safeguarding of the planet. Romain Clergeat cites the mission entrusted to the President of the Seychelles for oceanology at the service of sustainable development. The French journalist says that the archipelagos such as the Maldives, Tuvalu, the Marshall Islands, Kiribati or the Seychelles are only responsible for 0.2% of the carbon footprint in the world but that these countries are the biggest victims of this climatic phenomenon. He quotes President Ramkalawan who declares that the industrialized countries responsible for this ecological catastrophe are “very strong in exposing this problem, but very slow to act”.
In his interview with Paris Match, the President of the Seychelles asked for “the exchange of our debt against environmental protection measures”. To a question from a French journalist about the seriousness of the problem, President Ramkalawan replied that it is a question of survival for threatened states. For him, these countries do not dramatize the problem but are mostly realistic when it comes to the urgency of the situation. “Today, the Seychelles have 115 islands but in a few decades only 39 of our granite islands will remain,” predicts the Seychellois Chief of State.
Evoking the actions taken by his country since years, President Ramkalawan declared to Paris Match that his country avoids mass tourism, that a moratorium on the construction of hotels has been imposed, that a vast reforestation program is underway , and that his country encourages responsible fishing.
To finish his plea to save the planet, Wavel Ramkalawan asks rich and industrialized countries not to judge their country “by its successes but rather by its vulnerabilities.” ยป
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