{"id":1302823,"date":"2023-10-30T14:32:46","date_gmt":"2023-10-30T14:32:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/grist.org\/?p=621224"},"modified":"2023-10-30T14:32:46","modified_gmt":"2023-10-30T14:32:46","slug":"conservation-in-the-21st-century-means-looking-beyond-the-environment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2023\/10\/30\/conservation-in-the-21st-century-means-looking-beyond-the-environment\/","title":{"rendered":"Conservation in the 21st century means looking beyond the environment"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
To combat the biodiversity crisis, the Sierra Club supports establishing a national goal to conserve at least 30 percent of U.S. land, and 30 percent of U.S. ocean areas by 2030. Known as the 30×30 Agenda, this campaign has the potential to not only benefit wildlife, but improve outdoor equity and expand representation of historically marginalized groups on public lands. This three-part series explores the potential implications of such measures from locations across the country.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Growing up in the shadows of the Castner Range<\/a> near El Paso, Texas, \u00c1ngel Pe\u00f1a saw the mountain range on his way home from elementary school every day. Where Mexican yellow poppies once bloomed every spring, he watched developments rise, with the high desert shrinking by almost half over the course of his lifetime. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Now the executive director of the non-profit Nuestra Tierra Conservation Project<\/a>, he says, “I grew up there on Dyer Street, near the range, and never really understood its importance until I became an adult, and until I became a parent.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n For decades, local activists like Pe\u00f1a have organized to try to protect the remaining ecosystem as a national monument. He\u2019s now leading Nuestra Tierra\u2019s \u201cProtect Castner\u201d campaign, which emphasizes both the landscape and the unique multiculturalism that comes with it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The area is predominately Hispanic,<\/a> and home to many immigrants. The community holds strong ties to their Chihuahuan landscape, which has defined many families on the Frontera since before the Castner Range was given to the U.S. military in 1939.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n Under its ownership, citizens couldn\u2019t visit the range, and residents feared the constant threat of the Department of Defense selling the land to the highest bidder. People like Pe\u00f1a argued that by protecting the nearby desert, the area could increase outdoor accessibility for this underprivileged community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Hopes surged when in Biden\u2019s first few weeks in office, he signed an ambitious executive order,<\/a> announcing a national goal of protecting a third of the country\u2019s lands and oceans by 2030. He also launched the Justice 40 initiative<\/a>, which aims to help marginalized communities through investment in climate-resilient infrastructure. The orders aimed to not only reduce climate impacts but strengthen cultural connections to wild places. This March, the Biden administration officially designated the Castner Range, along with Avi Kwa Ame in Nevada, as monuments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n