Regions and Cohesion

Between the time when the editors’ note below was written and this issue of Regions & Cohesion went to press, Hurricane Otis battered Acapulco and surrounding villages or communities in Guerrero, Mexico, with sustained winds of 266 km/h — and even stronger gusts hitting up to 330 km/h. Regions & Cohesion has published numerous articles on socioenvironmental sustainability in Acapulco, and a research team from the Universidad Autónoma de Guerrero has even published a recent article on resilience to hurricanes (see Lucero Álvarez et al., 2021). Unfortunately, Acapulco was not prepared for Hurricane Otis, which killed dozens of people, destroyed homes and upended lives, causing over one billion dollars of damage. Three weeks after the hurricane, most of the one million residents of the city remain without food and water. With this note, the editors express our heartfelt solidarity with all the affected people during these difficult times and our commitment to your well-being.

The article identifies an empirical blind spot in the literature on hydro-hegemony, with a scant analysis of power relations and resource control between states in transboundary water relations in a Latin American context. This article aims to fill this gap by examining Brazilian hydro-hegemony in the case of the Brazilian–Paraguayan Itaipu hydroelectric dam, the second-largest hydroelectric dam in the world by production. Based on a literature review and analysis of interviews with regional experts, it is argued that Brazilian hydro-hegemony can be best understood as consensual hegemony, resulting in consensual hydro- hegemony as a distinct and understudied form. In the Itaipu case, Brazil established such a hydro-hegemony through the dam's binational administrative company, containing Paraguay within a structure that leads to Brazil-skewed resource control.

This research aims to present carbon monoxide (CO) emissions trends from January 2019 to June 2021 in Southeast Asian waters and the South China Sea (SEA-SCS). Using securitization theory, the data obtained from geospatial analysis was the basis for constructing CO as a threat. The results showed high CO density in the region due to economic activities that caused pressure on the marine air environment. Unfortunately, this has not been explicitly discussed in regional maritime cooperation, even though the states and territories bordering these waters are increasingly vulnerable to climate change. This article argues that securitizing CO as a threat represents substantial progress in the environmental- political cooperation in the SCS and surrounding waters.

Pig agribusiness has expanded globally, triggering ecological, health, and social problems. In this review, we adapted the DPSIR model to systematize the impacts and responses as interactions in karst social-ecological systems, whose physical characteristics increase their vulnerability to environmental contamination. We identified 47 publications documenting environmental impacts (45) and responses focusing on improving farm operations, designing better monitoring and surveillance systems, and improving regulatory and planning schemes. To a lesser extent, we document the impacts on governance (17) and health (9), with responses focusing on denouncing and defending the territory. Approaching the karst areas as a social-ecological system allowed us to identify research gaps and reflect on the challenges facing the needed transformation of food production under sustainability and environmental justice principles.

The United Nations (UN) 2023 Water Conference was held from March 22–24 at the UN Headquarters in New York, USA. There was a clear message from Day 1 of the Conference: “we are not on track to achieving Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6 on water and sanitation for all.” Moreover, business-as-usual approaches for water management do not seem effective facing the so-called triple planetary crisis of climate change, pollution, and biodiversity loss (What is the Triple Planetary Crisis? | UNFCCC). Hence, the Conference aimed to raise awareness of the global water crisis and to make agreements on concerted actions to mobilize all sectors, stakeholders, and countries toward the resolution of this global issue. Among them, the agreement to establish a UN Special Envoy for Water (different figure than the Special Rapporteur on the Human Right to Water), ground more than seven hundred voluntary commitments and pledges, and renew the political momentum in fora such as the High-Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development, held this July 2023, and the SDG Summit in September 2023 to follow up on the SDGs and Agenda 2030, as well as the commitments of the Decade for Action on Water (2018–2028).The UN, in fact, has promoted numerous initiatives to mobilize citizens around the SDGs. Presently, the UN has declared a total of 206 International Environmental Days to honor specific human and environmental subjects. Among them, only 40 are specifically related to the environment or socio-environmental issues. The majority of all of these declarations are followed by “mega-conferences”¹ related to the same subjects: that is, RAMSAR/wetlands sites, sustainable development, biodiversity, climate change, and the latest one is water. The UN states that these commemorative dates and fora are meant to “educate the public on issues of concern, to mobilize political will and resources to address global problems, and to celebrate and reinforce achievements of humanity” (United Nations, 2023) ). We have nothing against the raising of awareness and the need to take political action, but we would rather like to offer a reflection on two critical and historical challenges related to these global events: (a) the implementation of global water fora accords from global-to-local governance, and (b) the need for broader and inclusive participation of different stakeholders, with particular focus on water issues.

Coyuca de Benítez es un municipio costero de la “Costa Grande” del estado mexicano de Guerrero, es catalogado como de muy alto y alto riesgo de inundación por eventos hidrometeorológicos extremos, convirtiéndose en la zona más vulnerable al cambio climático global del estado. La hidrografía del municipio la componen tres subcuencas: A. Cacalutla, R. Coyuca y B. Acapulco, todas son exorreicas y desembocan en La Barra. En el municipio se desarrollan actividades económicas como el cultivo de coco para la producción de copra, cultivo de varios mangos, pesca, acuicultura (tilapia y camarón), comercio y turismo. La mayoría de estas actividades se desarrollan en la llanura costera, la parte baja del municipio. El turismo se concentra en el curso inferior del río Coyuca, a la altura del puente principal municipal, donde hay enramadas (restaurantes) que sirven mariscos a lo largo del río. Otro atractivo turístico es el sector conocido como “La Barra de Coyuca”, un arenal entre el mar y los cuerpos de agua del río Coyuca y las lagunas Mitla y Coyuca. Aquí se puede disfrutar de la playa, la gastronomía local, actividades como observación de aves y paseos en bote por los manglares de las lagunas. Este ecosistema costero brinda beneficios ambientales y socioeconómicos a varios pueblos, pero también representa un riesgo de inundaciones en época de lluvias y huracanes.