WEBVTT

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They used to make windshield wipers here.
But in the late 1980s

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the Trico Products Corporation closed
most of its operations in Buffalo

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and laid off more than 2,000 workers.
Then the company

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opened a new plant in Mexico just a
mile from the United States border.

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For several years Jean Martin
has been filling out forms

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at the state employment office.
I worked here for 19 years

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and thought I was gonna have
another 19 years to work.

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Took the jobs to Mexico and 2,500 of
us who\'ve gone out of, out of work

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and had to restart, retrain all over again.

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Used to see, on this floor alone there were
hundreds and hundreds of people working.

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Constant machinery being moved
around and equipment being repaired

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and parts being assembled and shipped to the next phase,
wherever, it was going. And then all of a sudden nothing,

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wide-open spaces, it\'s history, it\'s gone.

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By 1996,

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fewer than 200 production workers were left
at the remaining Trico plant in Buffalo.

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[music]

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[non-English narration]

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[music]

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Six days a week,

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Elisa Sanchez boards the bus in Matamoros
for the half hour ride to the Trico plant

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in the Finsa Industrial Park. The workforce
here is, typically, young female

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and originally from Mexico\'s Interior
where jobs are hard to find.

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In Buffalo, Jean Martin
made about $15 an hour

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in Matamoros Elisa Sanchez and
her fellow Trico employees

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make about a $1 an hour for the same work.

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The Trico plant is only one
of about 2,000 manufacturing

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and assembly plants on Mexico\'s northern
border. All of them were built since 1965

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under a special Mexican program
to attract foreign investment.

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They\'re called maquiladoras. Most are US
owned but there are companies from Canada,

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Europe, and Asia here too.
Together they employ

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about half a million Mexican workers.
The company names are familiar,

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they make auto parts, TV sets, chemicals.
New factories are going up every day.

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Some call this the new industrial
heartland for US corporations.

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Along Mexico\'s 2,000
mile border with the US,

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the maquiladoras are clustered around several
paired cities. The factories are usually located

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within a few miles and sometimes
within a few yards of the border.

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Most companies moved to Mexico to
take advantage of low Mexican wages.

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But something else kept
operating costs low,

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companies didn\'t need to comply with
costly environmental regulations

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when you cross the border, you can
pass across that invisible line,

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the rules change.

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The Finegoods recently moved their furniture
factory from Los Angeles to Tijuana

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a three-hour drive to the south.

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We were manufacturing furniture
in Los Angeles for about 35 years

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and about 4 years ago the environmental regulations
that are specific to Southern California

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got too stringent for us to continue
to operate in Southern California,

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and we looked at the possible alternatives
as to where to move and Mexico

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seemed to be the best choice at the time.
Here in Mexico, the environmental laws

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are virtually duplication of the
basic EPA laws as in regards

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to finishing operations within a furniture
factory. It\'s the Southern California laws

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that are an extremely stringent, and
it was because of the smog conditions

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in Southern California, the law required a limit
per day of how many pounds of (inaudible)

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that could go into the atmosphere. And
it was that law that would limit us

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to and some occasions stopped work at 2
o\'clock because we had reached our limit for

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are permits for the day.

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As an American company doing business here in
Mexico any hazardous materials that are created

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have to be exported out of the
country by hazardous waste hauler,

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and they\'re licensed haulers, and we do that, it\'s basically
the same operation that we had in the United States.

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But we operate here under all of the rules

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and regulations of Mexican
government to apply.

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Danny Finegood goes by the rules
but maquiladora operators don\'t.

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Wastes in unmarked drum stored behind
plants and untreated factory wastes

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dripping into open canals
are the first clues.

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That\'s just the beginning. The US Mexico
border has been described as a 2,000 mile long

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open sewer of vast toxic waste dump.

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The law that requires US
owned factories to return

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their hazardous wastes to the US was
often ignored. In the early 1990s

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about 90% of these wastes were being
stored or disposed of illegally in Mexico.

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Fundamentally Mexican environmental law

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is similar to the environmental
protection agency\'s rules in the US,

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but Mexican environmental law is
new, it\'s only been on the books

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since the 1980s, by that time, the
maquiladora program had been going on

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for more than 20 years.

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I think the pollution problems
in the northern border of Mexico

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are directly related to a program of rapid

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industrialization unaccompanied
by parallel development

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of either environmental
regulatory capability

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or basic physical environmental infrastructure
like water and wastewater treatment

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and municipal solid waste management. I think, the links
are clear if you look at the history of this region.

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They need about a million new jobs a year.

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They desperately need
more capital investment.

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The pressure to provide jobs to provide a
climate that is conducive to investment

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either foreign or domestic can
often override or tend to obscure

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environmental concerns and without
an active and informed citizenry

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those problems continue to
get swept under the rug.

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Environmental problems at the
border did get attention in 1990,

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when NAFTA, the North American Free Trade
Agreement between the United States,

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Mexico, and Canada was first proposed.
The national press reported

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continuing environmental damage
despite Mexico\'s new laws.

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Enforcement of environmental law is
the key element of environmental law,

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you can have all the restrictions you want and if they\'re
not enforced, industries have no incentive to comply.

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The debate over NAFTA included this.

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Free trade could set a
potential ecological disaster

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on a high-speed course. On the other hand
of treaty with environmental provisions

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could stop the destruction in its tracks.
Almost overnight

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environmental issues became central to the
relationship between the United States and Mexico.

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In the end, some environmental
measures did become part of NAFTA

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setting a historical president. By the
time the treaty went into effect in 1994

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a new era of environmental
activism on the border had began.

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In this documentary essay,
we look at the consequences

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of 25 years of environmental neglect, the
results of five years of earnest activity,

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[and the promises made for the future.
] Those hills is the plant.

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[music]

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We begin in Brownsville at the southern
tip of Texas, travel across this bridge,

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and you\'re in Matamoros. Once
before industrialization,

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the area was covered with
palm trees like these,

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a few remain in this carefully tended
preserve, a sublime memory of the past.

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Domingo Gonzalez an environmental
activist in Matamoros

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and Brownsville took us on
his toxic tour of Matamoros.

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We began at the chemical floor plant

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owned by DuPont. Here they make
hydrogen fluoride a chemical referred

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to by its initials HF.
HF or hydrogen fluoride

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is extremely, extremely dangerous, it
can cause the same type of damages

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that were caused by the accident

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at Bhopal India. And the
big danger, of course,

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is that there might, they\'re could be an
accident, the chemical leak at the plant

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that would be devastating to all
of these neighborhoods here.

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The plant was established before there
had been any scientific testing

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of just how dangerous HF was. And, in fact,

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four years prior to the 1976 Amoco tests

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and those Amoco tests
established a cloud of HF gas

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could travel at a lethal
level as many as 7 miles.

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Well, obviously, with that kind of
toxicity and that kind of danger

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would be affecting most,
not all of Matamoros,

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depending on the wind direction and also
Brownsville which is just about a half a mile

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to three-quarter mile from the plant here.

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And the neighborhoods were here long
before the plant was established,

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but the chemical company essentially
wants to create a safety a liability

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free zone around it where they would
not be liable for any damages

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in case of an accident,
they were responsible

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in to some degree, they did pay for crop damages
their emissions supposedly affected the plants.

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And we can see that this
community here was totally

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relying on agriculture.

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And, in fact, these are
the brand new grain,

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sorghum plant that is coming out now.
So DuPont

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and their Mexican partners essentially
compounding a problem they created way back.

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They never should have established a plant
that was this dangerous this close to a city.

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And second, they definitely
should not try to disposes

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even more people leaving
them without property

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so that they can have a zone
within which they feel safe

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in manufacturing HF. And
Stepan Chemicals begins there…

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Our second stop to Stepan Chemical Company
who\'s US headquarters are in Chicago.

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In Matamoros, they make chemical
ingredients for cosmetics.

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Until recently they made
pesticides here too,

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and they dumped toxic wastes into
open ponds on their property.

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But, worse, still they were dumping,
totally, untreated wastewater

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into the canal on their back. That\'s
where you found levels of benzene,

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we found Mercury, we found
xylene, plus Stepan

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was consistently having all sorts
of products with their equipment.

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It would have from ammonia leaks
to gas explosions of all sorts.

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Let\'s go down that road
beyond this car here.

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[sil.]

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The US has right to know laws

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which gives citizens the right to get information about
hazardous materials in their community or workplace.

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Mexico does not have right to know laws

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so environmental activists in Mexico
have to dig for their own information.

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Now it\'s being used as
a garbage dump, as it,

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a lot of areas. Well, this
can now has been covered up

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farther upstream but here you
can tell what was going on.

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We were to test this, we would still find

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some volatile organic compounds in there.
In fact, the last time we tested,

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we still found over 500 parts per million

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of xylene and xylene

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is supposed to evaporate,
it\'s supposed to be gone.

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This is where in the US the
EPA would have come out here

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and four step and (inaudible) and all
the companies to do a combined cleanup.

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But since it\'s we\'re just about
a mile from the border here

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on the Mexican side, companies have
been able to do it for a long,

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long time. In fact, they got away
with doing it for over 15 years.

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This neighborhood

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has suffered from being caught
between two chemical plants,

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some of the people got used to it but
others would just come in and leave.

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[non-English narration]

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Just now that the wind shifted in this direction
they got the smell from the chemical plant.

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[non-English narration]

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They say it\'s not as bad as when the cooling
ponds were there but it\'s still very noticing.

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You can also see some of the other problems

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that the industry has brought here.
The neighborhoods have grown rapidly

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and they\'re just isn\'t the kind of infrastructure
that the neighborhoods need, no paved streets,

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you can tell they\'re piles of
garbage all over the place

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and right here this very corner people burn their
trash since there are no trucks to come pick it up.

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And, roughly, 120 neighborhoods

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of this type in the city that
don\'t have the basic services.

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Let\'s look at some of the worst housing
in the area now. This canal here

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is both industrial wastewater and
the domestic wastewater system

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for the city. Most cities do
not have and cannot afford

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modern wastewater treatment facilities.

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In terms of individual wages,

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the highest paid workers would
be making around 6$ to 7$ a day

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and with that kind of wage workers
cannot afford regular housing,

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they cannot afford a mortgage. So
most people wind up living in houses

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they build themselves on
whatever land is available

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that is public lands that they
can squat on that is a type

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of dilemma that US investment
has created, too many people,

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not enough infrastructure,
not enough housing. =

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[sil.]

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We\'re at the special education
school in Matamoros,

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and it was the director of this school

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who in the early 80s began to notice

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there were similar characteristics among some of
the kids, she began to do some research on her own

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and discovered that all
the kids belong to moms

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who had worked in one particular
factory, the Mallory Capacitor factory

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and had been… While they were
pregnant had been exposed

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to all sorts of chemicals
including PCBs and ethylene

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and many, many others. The Mallory
kids, as they came to be known,

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had birth defects that range
from very mild retardation

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to very severe deformities.
These kids were sort of the

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(inaudible) program. They
were the first victims

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of this massive exposure to toxic chemicals

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at the workplace and environment.

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Across the border in Brownsville there
were more than 30 cases of anencephaly,

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a birth defect that is nearly always fatal.
The frequency

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was more than ten times the national rate.

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What we first observed
was extremely blatant.

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It was in a relatively small hospital
in Brownsville, Texas where we have

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between 2,000 to 2,500 deliveries a year,

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we had three babies born with
anencephaly in a 36-hour period.

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The babies are born

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with nothing from the skull back

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so that the eyes, of course,
are on the side instead

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of in the center, the ears
are usually malformed

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and if you look at the baby,
sort of like, an aerial view

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there is no cap over the head. They
are referred to in medical literature

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as frog like. When we
contacted the government

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in late spring, early summer, of \'91,

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and they came down and did the
investigation in July of \'91,

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by September of \'91 what they were
saying to us, \"Oh, it\'s nutritional.

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It\'s probably the fact that
women in your community

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are very poor and are not
getting an adequate diet.\"

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Well, you know, people in the valley
have been poor for a very long time

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and nutrition didn\'t dramatically
change in the fall and winter

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of \'90 that produce all of these anencephalic babies.
I mean, I don\'t know a lot about epidemiologist,

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and I quickly learned that, you know,

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I\'m not sure that, a lot of people really
do know how to approach this problem.

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And it happens to be where the
community is in the priority interests

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of the government agency
what the answers come out

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and that to me was unbelievable,
it really, really was.

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All of our instincts really told
us let\'s go back to the mothers.

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Many, over a third mentioned to us,

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\"The industry, and the
smell from the industry,

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and what is that doing to me, and I\'ve
often wondered if that was affecting me.\"

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Until then, I didn\'t even know we had a maquiladora
program, I didn\'t even know we had industry,

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until October of \'91, I did
not know we had industry,

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I thought we were
predominantly agricultural.

00:21:35.000 --> 00:21:39.999
And it took getting in the car and going
to find the industrial parks in Matamoros

00:21:40.000 --> 00:21:44.999
to just drop my teeth and say
why hasn\'t anybody told us

00:21:45.000 --> 00:21:49.999
that our population could be exposed to
industrial pollutants because I don\'t think

00:21:50.000 --> 00:21:54.999
that was certainly not unknown to me as a healthcare provider,
and I think it probably was not known to many people

00:21:55.000 --> 00:21:59.999
on this side of the border, it was,
one of our, best kept secrets.

00:22:00.000 --> 00:22:04.999
And, in fact, what we had was 94 major US

00:22:05.000 --> 00:22:09.999
and Canadian plants within two
to five miles of our borders.

00:22:10.000 --> 00:22:14.999
[sil.]

00:22:15.000 --> 00:22:19.999
Twenty-eight families filed
suit in Brownsville in 1993.

00:22:20.000 --> 00:22:24.999
They charged that their children\'s birth defects
had been caused by hazardous chemicals released

00:22:25.000 --> 00:22:29.999
into the environment by maquiladoras
across the border in Matamoros.

00:22:30.000 --> 00:22:34.999
The lawsuit was settled out of court
in 1995 for a reported $17 million,

00:22:35.000 --> 00:22:39.999
it is a groundbreaking case for
the border environmental movement

00:22:40.000 --> 00:22:44.999
because it establishes the use of American
courts to sue American factory owners

00:22:45.000 --> 00:22:49.999
for their activities in Mexico.

00:22:50.000 --> 00:22:54.999
Perhaps because of attention
brought by NAFTA,

00:22:55.000 --> 00:22:59.999
perhaps because of the anencephaly
lawsuit some maquiladoras in Matamoros

00:23:00.000 --> 00:23:04.999
have become more environmentally conscious.
There are hundreds of new stacks

00:23:05.000 --> 00:23:09.999
on factory buildings, they should
make it safer for the workers inside

00:23:10.000 --> 00:23:14.999
and where the stacks are fitted with filters
or scrubbers safer for the community outside.

00:23:15.000 --> 00:23:19.999
General Motors, once exposed for
discharging high levels of carcinogens

00:23:20.000 --> 00:23:24.999
next to this factory was first to build
its own wastewater treatment facility,

00:23:25.000 --> 00:23:29.999
soon other plants at the Finsa
Industrial Park will also

00:23:30.000 --> 00:23:34.999
have a wastewater treatment plant
financed by loans setup under NAFTA.

00:23:35.000 --> 00:23:43.000
[music]

00:23:45.000 --> 00:23:49.999
Tijuana is 2,000 miles west of Matamoros

00:23:50.000 --> 00:23:54.999
it was Mexico\'s 6th largest city next door to
San Diego, the 6th largest city in the US.

00:23:55.000 --> 00:23:59.999
Shortly, after the

00:24:00.000 --> 00:24:04.999
Chilpancingo neighborhood was settled, the Otay and
Mesa Industrial Park was built on a hill above it.

00:24:05.000 --> 00:24:09.999
(inaudible) is head of
the civic association.

00:24:10.000 --> 00:24:15.000
[sil.]

00:26:05.000 --> 00:26:09.999
The Chilpancingo neighborhood pressured government to enforce
its environmental laws, and the factories were ordered to stop

00:26:10.000 --> 00:26:14.999
sending contaminated wastewater through
the neighborhood. The flow has been

00:26:15.000 --> 00:26:20.000
cut to a trickle.

00:26:30.000 --> 00:26:34.999
In Tijuana, Mesa de Otay neighborhood

00:26:35.000 --> 00:26:39.999
community activists (inaudible)
have fought for land rights

00:26:40.000 --> 00:26:44.999
and for fair salaries. Now they hold
workshops to teach maquiladora employees

00:26:45.000 --> 00:26:49.999
about environmental hazards on the job.
What is dangerous and what to do.

00:26:50.000 --> 00:26:54.999
It is something you might expect
government or the unions to be doing

00:26:55.000 --> 00:27:03.000
but that\'s not the case.

00:27:15.000 --> 00:27:19.999
Because Mexico has no right to know laws,

00:27:20.000 --> 00:27:24.999
workers can\'t force an employer
to identify workplace hazards

00:27:25.000 --> 00:27:29.999
from San Diego the support committee for
maquiladora workers provides information

00:27:30.000 --> 00:27:34.999
that can help workers to learn
on their own. For example,

00:27:35.000 --> 00:27:39.999
if someone finds that they\'re using acetone
on the job, they can walk in this come here

00:27:40.000 --> 00:27:44.999
and find the English name, and then
over here see what the Spanish name is

00:27:45.000 --> 00:27:49.999
acetona over in this column.
And then in this book

00:27:50.000 --> 00:27:54.999
are descriptive sheets in Spanish

00:27:55.000 --> 00:27:59.999
for each of those chemicals.
And in these sheets

00:28:00.000 --> 00:28:04.999
there is much more in depth
information in regards to

00:28:05.000 --> 00:28:09.999
what is the actual danger of the chemical,

00:28:10.000 --> 00:28:14.999
what are the various problems
that it can cause health-wise

00:28:15.000 --> 00:28:19.999
and what should be done to protect workers
who are gonna be using this chemical.

00:28:20.000 --> 00:28:24.999
Workshop participants

00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:29.999
didn\'t want their identities revealed, but they told
us about skin irritations and respiratory distress.

00:28:30.000 --> 00:28:34.999
They were afraid that asking
their employers for gloves masks

00:28:35.000 --> 00:28:40.000
or better ventilation could
cost them their jobs.

00:29:10.000 --> 00:29:14.999
In the outskirts of Tijuana

00:29:15.000 --> 00:29:19.999
another kind of parallel to the borders environment,
hazardous waste brought to Mexico from the US.

00:29:20.000 --> 00:29:24.999
Here the RSR Corporation of
Dallas brought used batteries

00:29:25.000 --> 00:29:29.999
and lead smelter wastes to the Alco Pacífico
plants so that the led, they contain,

00:29:30.000 --> 00:29:34.999
could be recycled. We visited
the site with Jose Bravo.

00:29:35.000 --> 00:29:43.000
[sil.]

00:29:50.000 --> 00:29:54.999
The Alco Pacífico plant operated for 12 years
after a brief strike the plant closed in 1991.

00:29:55.000 --> 00:29:59.999
The place looks like it
was abandoned in a hurry.

00:30:00.000 --> 00:30:04.999
We saw conveyor belts stopped with batteries
still on them, pieces of machinery,

00:30:05.000 --> 00:30:09.999
open vats of mysterious
liquids and piles of residues

00:30:10.000 --> 00:30:14.999
containing lead. This is industrial
waste led waste from the United States.

00:30:15.000 --> 00:30:19.999
And this is brought here to
Mexico and reprocessed again

00:30:20.000 --> 00:30:24.999
and more lead is extracted
from this and over to the left

00:30:25.000 --> 00:30:29.999
of this lead waste is the reddish piles that are
then, what the result of the smelting process

00:30:30.000 --> 00:30:34.999
it\'s called led slag and that
in itself is very dangerous

00:30:35.000 --> 00:30:39.999
and it\'s the major part of the
problem here on the site.

00:30:40.000 --> 00:30:44.999
Here\'s a padlock on the front gate
but the fence around these hazards

00:30:45.000 --> 00:30:49.999
has holes in it big enough
to drive a truck through

00:30:50.000 --> 00:30:54.999
and worse. The nearest neighbors
to these led waste piles

00:30:55.000 --> 00:30:59.999
are dairy cows.

00:31:00.000 --> 00:31:04.999
The district attorney in Los Angeles
sued the plants American owner

00:31:05.000 --> 00:31:09.999
for illegally transporting these
wastes into Mexico through California,

00:31:10.000 --> 00:31:14.999
the $2.5 million he won will only
pay for a rudimentary cleanup here.

00:31:15.000 --> 00:31:19.999
To us,

00:31:20.000 --> 00:31:24.999
it\'s what can happen when there is no regulation
and when there is inadequate infrastructure

00:31:25.000 --> 00:31:29.999
in a country that can deal with
its own problems in regards

00:31:30.000 --> 00:31:34.999
to environmental issues. The
question then here, for us,

00:31:35.000 --> 00:31:39.999
is there no inspectors here
for those 12 to 13 years.

00:31:40.000 --> 00:31:44.999
Was this site never inspected and if
it was, why was they let go like this,

00:31:45.000 --> 00:31:49.999
why is there so much contamination here.
Cleanup plans

00:31:50.000 --> 00:31:54.999
have not yet been finalized by the
Mexican environmental agency.

00:31:55.000 --> 00:31:59.999
So behind me is my community

00:32:00.000 --> 00:32:04.999
that this Playas de Tijuana, to my left
hand is the whole city of Tijuana.

00:32:05.000 --> 00:32:09.999
And one mile away above
those hills is the plant

00:32:10.000 --> 00:32:14.999
of Chemical Waste Management.
Somewhere in these hills

00:32:15.000 --> 00:32:19.999
completely hidden from public
view, the American owned company

00:32:20.000 --> 00:32:24.999
was building a hazardous waste incinerator.
To burn the PCBs,

00:32:25.000 --> 00:32:29.999
what was dioxins, and we didn\'t know
anything about it, we are housewives

00:32:30.000 --> 00:32:34.999
and maybe our world is so narrow that
we don\'t have a lot of information.

00:32:35.000 --> 00:32:39.999
So when we didn\'t know what to do

00:32:40.000 --> 00:32:44.999
we were asking ourselves so what can we do.
It was a real problem for us,

00:32:45.000 --> 00:32:49.999
but we had to think about it.

00:32:50.000 --> 00:32:54.999
What was worse to get into the
struggle or get into the danger

00:32:55.000 --> 00:32:59.999
of losing our lives and the lives
of our children and our food

00:33:00.000 --> 00:33:04.999
and everything to be poisoned? Very quickly the
women brought together engineers, doctors,

00:33:05.000 --> 00:33:09.999
teachers, politicians, and community
activists from both Mexico and the US,

00:33:10.000 --> 00:33:14.999
they gathered information and
then they get down to business.

00:33:15.000 --> 00:33:19.999
So we had to socially make actions

00:33:20.000 --> 00:33:24.999
like protest and pressuring
and by the radio,

00:33:25.000 --> 00:33:29.999
by the newspapers, TV channels,

00:33:30.000 --> 00:33:34.999
we had a lot of support from
the American TV channels

00:33:35.000 --> 00:33:39.999
and doing it constantly, constantly.
The authorities were

00:33:40.000 --> 00:33:44.999
against us saying that we were crazy, we
didn\'t know what we were talking about.

00:33:45.000 --> 00:33:49.999
But, amazingly, the President
Salinas said exactly

00:33:50.000 --> 00:33:54.999
what we were saying when he counseled the
license to operate this incinerator.

00:33:55.000 --> 00:33:59.999
Isn\'t that amazing? Currently, there are no
facilities in Mexico for the disposal of PCBs.

00:34:00.000 --> 00:34:04.999
At the northern edge of Tijuana,

00:34:05.000 --> 00:34:09.999
Mexico and the United States are
separated by an invisible line

00:34:10.000 --> 00:34:14.999
now being made visible by the
construction of a metal fence. The fence

00:34:15.000 --> 00:34:19.999
is supposed to prevent Mexican citizens
from illegally entering the United States.

00:34:20.000 --> 00:34:24.999
The fences has had no effect
on the migration of pollution.

00:34:25.000 --> 00:34:29.999
I call it the tyranny of the geography.

00:34:30.000 --> 00:34:34.999
You can see that the city
of Tijuana is higher

00:34:35.000 --> 00:34:39.999
than the counterpart lands on
United State side. So, obviously,

00:34:40.000 --> 00:34:44.999
with the propensity of water to flow downhill, renegade
sewage discharges are gonna come into the United States,

00:34:45.000 --> 00:34:49.999
they don\'t know a border, they
only know the law of gravity.

00:34:50.000 --> 00:34:54.999
What you see here is the low point
of the entire Mexican system

00:34:55.000 --> 00:34:59.999
and across the fence there

00:35:00.000 --> 00:35:04.999
is what\'s known as Mexican pump station
number one. And when that pump station

00:35:05.000 --> 00:35:09.999
has a malfunction or the flows get
too large that it can\'t be taken,

00:35:10.000 --> 00:35:14.999
the sewage, the raw, untreated sewage
goes down to its low point in the system,

00:35:15.000 --> 00:35:19.999
which is right here, and enters the United
States moves down through these various drains

00:35:20.000 --> 00:35:24.999
and gullies, and this is only one of
many, works its way into the river,

00:35:25.000 --> 00:35:29.999
the Tijuana River is located in
this area over here, and eventually

00:35:30.000 --> 00:35:34.999
goes all the way down to the beach.
We had a situation approximately

00:35:35.000 --> 00:35:39.999
six weeks ago where the
entire system in Tijuana

00:35:40.000 --> 00:35:44.999
went down completely. There was a
break in the force (inaudible)

00:35:45.000 --> 00:35:49.999
that takes all of the sewage up the hill to their
plan and literally the entire wastewater production

00:35:50.000 --> 00:35:54.999
of a city of a million plus people

00:35:55.000 --> 00:35:59.999
came down through this drain and that
type of situation is just intolerable.

00:36:00.000 --> 00:36:04.999
And with that Dave Schlesinger walked us
about 300 yards north of the border fence

00:36:05.000 --> 00:36:09.999
to the place where both countries had
finally agreed to build a treatment plant.

00:36:10.000 --> 00:36:14.999
In 1996,

00:36:15.000 --> 00:36:19.999
the new bi-national treatment plant began
to rise at a cost of $400 million.

00:36:20.000 --> 00:36:24.999
To solve a problem that has
existed for over 60 years,

00:36:25.000 --> 00:36:29.999
it will intercept Tijuana sewage at the border,
treat it, and send it through a tunnel 18,000 feet

00:36:30.000 --> 00:36:34.999
out into the Pacific Ocean.

00:36:35.000 --> 00:36:39.999
About three miles from the
new centralized, high-tech,

00:36:40.000 --> 00:36:44.999
high-priced sewage treatment plant is a big green
patch and the otherwise Brown hills of Tijuana,

00:36:45.000 --> 00:36:49.999
it\'s the site of a low-tech,
decentralized sewage treatment project

00:36:50.000 --> 00:36:54.999
a marvel of simplicity. It has few moving
parts and uses little electricity.

00:36:55.000 --> 00:36:59.999
It was designed and built
by a bi-national group,

00:37:00.000 --> 00:37:04.999
it\'s called EcoParque.

00:37:05.000 --> 00:37:09.999
There\'s two ways of approaching this.

00:37:10.000 --> 00:37:14.999
One way is to say that wastewater is a problem, the
other is to say that wastewater is a resource.

00:37:15.000 --> 00:37:19.999
When you think that wastewater is a
problem, you centralize your facility

00:37:20.000 --> 00:37:24.999
at the tail end of town, and you get this
problem there so that you can dispose of it.

00:37:25.000 --> 00:37:29.999
But Tijuana with no urban greenery,

00:37:30.000 --> 00:37:34.999
with an erosion problem that manifested
itself tremendously in January of 1993,

00:37:35.000 --> 00:37:39.999
I mean, there was so much
mud, rocks deposited

00:37:40.000 --> 00:37:44.999
and (inaudible) in streets and pave
streets (inaudible) is all over Tijuana,

00:37:45.000 --> 00:37:49.999
it paralyzed the city that you can,

00:37:50.000 --> 00:37:54.999
you could see for the first time
what erosion was really doing.

00:37:55.000 --> 00:37:59.999
And when you start talking
about revegetating a city

00:38:00.000 --> 00:38:04.999
as (inaudible) Tijuana,
you\'re gonna find yourself

00:38:05.000 --> 00:38:09.999
with the need for the resource water.

00:38:10.000 --> 00:38:14.999
And wastewater is 99.97% water.

00:38:15.000 --> 00:38:19.999
So it\'s a resource and if you
manage it as a resource,

00:38:20.000 --> 00:38:24.999
you need to decentralize, decentralization
means small treatment plants

00:38:25.000 --> 00:38:29.999
localized in a way they can
produce reclaimed water

00:38:30.000 --> 00:38:34.999
for the benefit of the environment. We\'re
picking up the water from a sewer collector

00:38:35.000 --> 00:38:39.999
which is down this road. It picks up water
from the Colonia which is up the Mesa here.

00:38:40.000 --> 00:38:44.999
First step is to get the water
into a channel, screen it,

00:38:45.000 --> 00:38:49.999
and get the rough objects out, the
plastic bags, that dead chickens,

00:38:50.000 --> 00:38:54.999
or whatever is in the sewer,
then we go in to the hydrosieve.

00:38:55.000 --> 00:38:59.999
Screens the rough solids,
oxidizes the water a bit,

00:39:00.000 --> 00:39:04.999
then we measure the flow rate through a
parshall flume, once it goes through there,

00:39:05.000 --> 00:39:09.999
we release it, it goes down the trickling
filter, biological treatment occurs there,

00:39:10.000 --> 00:39:14.999
lot of oxidation, then we measure
again to see how much water

00:39:15.000 --> 00:39:19.999
is going through each of the two
filters before it goes into a pipe

00:39:20.000 --> 00:39:24.999
and into this clarifier.
There we pick up the solids

00:39:25.000 --> 00:39:29.999
and the under drain. We leave the
water, put it into series of pumps.

00:39:30.000 --> 00:39:34.999
For the first time, we\'ll use
electrical energy in the system there,

00:39:35.000 --> 00:39:39.999
we pump the water up to that tank up there.
From that tank,

00:39:40.000 --> 00:39:44.999
we\'d release it by gravity flow through that sprinkler
system that you can see operating right now.

00:39:45.000 --> 00:39:49.999
I can envision 20 to 25

00:39:50.000 --> 00:39:54.999
maybe 30 of this of these

00:39:55.000 --> 00:39:59.999
and as the city would grow more
and more because one thing

00:40:00.000 --> 00:40:04.999
that\'s unanswered in a
centralized facility concept

00:40:05.000 --> 00:40:09.999
is that what happens when the city grows.
We can have

00:40:10.000 --> 00:40:14.999
an organic agriculture complex
here, we can have sales of fruit,

00:40:15.000 --> 00:40:19.999
bees, honey, we want aquaculture

00:40:20.000 --> 00:40:24.999
to be incorporated into our activities.

00:40:25.000 --> 00:40:29.999
We can get the community involved
in the environmental preservation

00:40:30.000 --> 00:40:34.999
within cities. And I think that\'s very
important, especially, in places like Mexico

00:40:35.000 --> 00:40:39.999
and the rest of Latin America where
almost 70% of the population

00:40:40.000 --> 00:40:44.999
has already living in cities. The
sewage that escapes from Tijuana,

00:40:45.000 --> 00:40:49.999
invades the Tijuana River Estuary an
ecologically important wetlands area

00:40:50.000 --> 00:40:54.999
at the border next to the Pacific Ocean. Until
now there was a Mexican Tijuana River watershed

00:40:55.000 --> 00:40:59.999
and there was an American one
and each country made decisions

00:41:00.000 --> 00:41:04.999
about the area as if that border and now that
fence had influenced the course of nature.

00:41:05.000 --> 00:41:09.999
Tijuana community activist (inaudible)

00:41:10.000 --> 00:41:14.999
and a diverse bi-national group want
to change that. They view the area

00:41:15.000 --> 00:41:19.999
as a bioregion defined not by political
boundaries but by natural boundaries.

00:41:20.000 --> 00:41:24.999
One of their first tasks was to make
their own maps of the bioregion

00:41:25.000 --> 00:41:29.999
because every map they had been
able to find Mexico or in the US

00:41:30.000 --> 00:41:34.999
stopped at the border. Okay,
this is one of the first maps

00:41:35.000 --> 00:41:39.999
that we were able to come
up with, and it shows

00:41:40.000 --> 00:41:44.999
how 70% of this watershed is on
the Mexican side of the border.

00:41:45.000 --> 00:41:49.999
So this is the beginning of
our basic core of knowledge

00:41:50.000 --> 00:41:54.999
about the watershed, and we
continue with vegetation,

00:41:55.000 --> 00:41:59.999
seismic fault, and we hope to add layers
and layers and layers of information.

00:42:00.000 --> 00:42:04.999
We left one of Lauer\'s offices and went
to another to continue the conversation.

00:42:05.000 --> 00:42:09.999
This fence is flagged from 1849

00:42:10.000 --> 00:42:14.999
it\'s to remind us of the symbolism

00:42:15.000 --> 00:42:19.999
of friendship between the people of Mexico

00:42:20.000 --> 00:42:24.999
and the United States and to commemorate
the idea of a collateral border park,

00:42:25.000 --> 00:42:29.999
which originally

00:42:30.000 --> 00:42:34.999
was symbolized by this one circle.

00:42:35.000 --> 00:42:39.999
And it seems like we\'re left with a plaque,

00:42:40.000 --> 00:42:44.999
with a park on the other side of a
fence, and the border patrol watching

00:42:45.000 --> 00:42:49.999
over anything that might crossover it.

00:42:50.000 --> 00:42:54.999
This is one of the

00:42:55.000 --> 00:42:59.999
busiest extensions of my office,

00:43:00.000 --> 00:43:04.999
this wonderful

00:43:05.000 --> 00:43:09.999
counter here where we meet with

00:43:10.000 --> 00:43:14.999
the people across this fence
who are also preoccupied with

00:43:15.000 --> 00:43:19.999
the environmental health of the estuary.
Sometimes, when

00:43:20.000 --> 00:43:24.999
the lines at the border get too long,
we facilitate our work by coming here.

00:43:25.000 --> 00:43:29.999
In the best of cases,

00:43:30.000 --> 00:43:34.999
it\'s where the two countries
come together not

00:43:35.000 --> 00:43:39.999
what divides them.

00:43:40.000 --> 00:43:44.999
And so we are

00:43:45.000 --> 00:43:49.999
initiating at a local
level several projects

00:43:50.000 --> 00:43:54.999
that involve by financial cooperation.
It just seems like the only way

00:43:55.000 --> 00:43:59.999
to address water issues,
air issues, waste disposal

00:44:00.000 --> 00:44:04.999
it is not

00:44:05.000 --> 00:44:09.999
Mexico\'s problem or the US
problem, it\'s a common problem.

00:44:10.000 --> 00:44:14.999
Concretely, this project
that we\'re working on

00:44:15.000 --> 00:44:19.999
called the Tijuana River
Watershed management project

00:44:20.000 --> 00:44:24.999
is originally inspired by the
protection of one part of the watershed

00:44:25.000 --> 00:44:29.999
that led us to see that there
wasn\'t a single thing happening

00:44:30.000 --> 00:44:34.999
on the watershed that didn\'t have to do with the
estuary and, therefore, it had to be brought

00:44:35.000 --> 00:44:39.999
to light. So what we have now

00:44:40.000 --> 00:44:44.999
is scientists on both sides of the border,

00:44:45.000 --> 00:44:49.999
academics on both sides of the border,
local governments, state governments,

00:44:50.000 --> 00:44:54.999
water managers, city developers,
and definitely, the residents

00:44:55.000 --> 00:44:59.999
who are sensitive and affected
by many of the decisions

00:45:00.000 --> 00:45:04.999
that are being made by governments.

00:45:05.000 --> 00:45:13.000
[music]

00:45:15.000 --> 00:45:19.999
At the borders midpoint at
Ciudad Juarez and El Paso.

00:45:20.000 --> 00:45:24.999
Juarez has over 300 maquiladoras
and 1.7 million residents.

00:45:25.000 --> 00:45:29.999
It has no sewage treatment plant. All of
the city\'s wastes empty into this canal

00:45:30.000 --> 00:45:34.999
which flows for 60 miles before
it is diverted into farmlands

00:45:35.000 --> 00:45:39.999
or into the Rio Grande River. As serious
as this is the people of Juarez,

00:45:40.000 --> 00:45:44.999
and its neighbor El Paso have a
more urgent environmental problem,

00:45:45.000 --> 00:45:49.999
it\'s the quality of the air they breathe. Juarez
and El Paso form a continuous metropolitan areas

00:45:50.000 --> 00:45:54.999
separated only by a border that
follows the Rio Grande River.

00:45:55.000 --> 00:45:59.999
You have to look hard to see where one
country stops and the other starts.

00:46:00.000 --> 00:46:04.999
This is Juarez, this El Paso.

00:46:05.000 --> 00:46:09.999
More than two million people live in
a basin that is ringed by mountains,

00:46:10.000 --> 00:46:14.999
a geography that traps and
concentrates air pollution.

00:46:15.000 --> 00:46:19.999
This is a story that begins
on the US side of the border.

00:46:20.000 --> 00:46:24.999
El Paso has had a history of bad air
quality. We\'ve exceeded standards

00:46:25.000 --> 00:46:29.999
of the criteria pollutants
for at least 20 years.

00:46:30.000 --> 00:46:34.999
But when the Environmental
Protection Agency was demanding

00:46:35.000 --> 00:46:39.999
that El Paso come into
compliance, we attempted

00:46:40.000 --> 00:46:44.999
to inform them that the problem was not all

00:46:45.000 --> 00:46:49.999
El Paso\'s but rather emissions that
were coming from south of the border.

00:46:50.000 --> 00:46:54.999
And for many years the EPA
refused to accept the fact

00:46:55.000 --> 00:46:59.999
that some of the pollution did
not originate in El Paso.

00:47:00.000 --> 00:47:04.999
El Paso has tried everything. It
requires annual vehicle inspection,

00:47:05.000 --> 00:47:09.999
cars must use expensive cleaner burning
fuels, little used, streets are paved,

00:47:10.000 --> 00:47:14.999
the solvents in household products like paint
and personal deodorant are controlled,

00:47:15.000 --> 00:47:19.999
dry cleaners, printing presses, and auto
paint shops have severe restrictions,

00:47:20.000 --> 00:47:24.999
new industry is limited. And
all this at great sacrifice,

00:47:25.000 --> 00:47:29.999
El Paso is the fourth poorest
city in the United States.

00:47:30.000 --> 00:47:34.999
We\'re doing more and more in El
Paso, but it\'s being canceled

00:47:35.000 --> 00:47:39.999
by the growth and activities
in Ciudad Juarez.

00:47:40.000 --> 00:47:44.999
Air pollution in Juarez comes from
unregulated industrial emissions,

00:47:45.000 --> 00:47:49.999
burning garbage dumps, and vehicle
exhaust 85% of the cars in Juarez

00:47:50.000 --> 00:47:54.999
and are more than 10 years old. And
Juarez is a center for brick making.

00:47:55.000 --> 00:47:59.999
There are whole neighborhoods of brick kilns where
tires and other dirty burning fuels have been used.

00:48:00.000 --> 00:48:04.999
About 70% of the streets and
this growing city or unpaved

00:48:05.000 --> 00:48:09.999
and dust hangs in the air. In
the winter, many of the city\'s,

00:48:10.000 --> 00:48:14.999
poor residents burned trash or
cardboard to heat their homes.

00:48:15.000 --> 00:48:19.999
And on the way back to the US long
lines of cars their motors idling wait

00:48:20.000 --> 00:48:24.999
sometimes up to three hours
to pass through US customs.

00:48:25.000 --> 00:48:29.999
All the work that we\'ve done in El Paso,

00:48:30.000 --> 00:48:34.999
all the controls that we implemented
and yet we don\'t see the reductions.

00:48:35.000 --> 00:48:39.999
So we have all realized that in order to
reduce pollution in the basin, in El Paso,

00:48:40.000 --> 00:48:44.999
we should put our dollars and our
efforts into something in Mexico

00:48:45.000 --> 00:48:49.999
or in Juarez waters that
will have a benefit

00:48:50.000 --> 00:48:54.999
not only to El Paso but to the
entire air basin. For example,

00:48:55.000 --> 00:48:59.999
if we help the citizens of Ciudad
Juarez to tune up their cars,

00:49:00.000 --> 00:49:04.999
at least, once a year that
will decrease pollution

00:49:05.000 --> 00:49:09.999
from their vehicles by a good 80%.
If we were to invest

00:49:10.000 --> 00:49:14.999
those few dollars in the US, the
net reduction would probably

00:49:15.000 --> 00:49:19.999
be maybe 5% or 10%. The cities
began to work together in 1993.

00:49:20.000 --> 00:49:24.999
The key supporter in Juarez
was Francisco Nuñez,

00:49:25.000 --> 00:49:29.999
the City\'s Director of Sanitation.
He has an inspiring history,

00:49:30.000 --> 00:49:34.999
when federal environmental officials failed to
enforce the rules limiting industrial discharges

00:49:35.000 --> 00:49:39.999
into his city\'s sewers, he built
his own labs, did his own tests,

00:49:40.000 --> 00:49:44.999
and he exposed wrongdoing.
Now we have around

00:49:45.000 --> 00:49:49.999
94%, 96% of the total industry under
control. That\'s was not easy.

00:49:50.000 --> 00:49:54.999
The federal government,

00:49:55.000 --> 00:49:59.999
the Chamber of Industry, and the
other association of maquiladoras,

00:50:00.000 --> 00:50:04.999
they go against us because we\'re trying

00:50:05.000 --> 00:50:09.999
to regulate them. It\'s incredible.

00:50:10.000 --> 00:50:14.999
They are very angry, they was very angry,

00:50:15.000 --> 00:50:19.999
and they called me a ecological tourist.

00:50:20.000 --> 00:50:24.999
Now a bi-national group from industry,
academia, environmental organizations,

00:50:25.000 --> 00:50:29.999
and from all levels of government decide how
to manage the bi-national air they breathe.

00:50:30.000 --> 00:50:34.999
It took a formal treaty signed in
1996 to give them control over

00:50:35.000 --> 00:50:39.999
what they call their common airshed.

00:50:40.000 --> 00:50:44.999
I think the first thing you have to understand,
the first complication is the fact that

00:50:45.000 --> 00:50:49.999
federal regulations and federal programs

00:50:50.000 --> 00:50:54.999
in the United States or in Mexico
are designed to stop at the border.

00:50:55.000 --> 00:50:59.999
And so if the problem is a common airshed

00:51:00.000 --> 00:51:04.999
there\'s no real existing federal regulation

00:51:05.000 --> 00:51:09.999
and federal program to help
you solve the problem.

00:51:10.000 --> 00:51:14.999
In fact, you have to break
through the existing regulations

00:51:15.000 --> 00:51:19.999
in order to deal with the problem. Now,
fortunately, with respect to the US, Mexico border,

00:51:20.000 --> 00:51:24.999
we do have a series of agreements
and a history of planning

00:51:25.000 --> 00:51:29.999
and meeting and discussing and working on

00:51:30.000 --> 00:51:34.999
the common problems that exist at the
border, what we don\'t have a history

00:51:35.000 --> 00:51:39.999
of is the creation of management
institutions that would actually

00:51:40.000 --> 00:51:44.999
put us in a mode where we could
implement a solution to the problem.

00:51:45.000 --> 00:51:49.999
And so the creation of an International
Air Quality Management District

00:51:50.000 --> 00:51:54.999
for the El Paso-Juarez area is groundbreaking
work in the sense of giving us

00:51:55.000 --> 00:51:59.999
a management institution.

00:52:00.000 --> 00:52:04.999
We saw some of the bi-national efforts,
earliest accomplishments in Juarez

00:52:05.000 --> 00:52:09.999
with Carlos Rincon of the
Environmental Defense Fund.

00:52:10.000 --> 00:52:14.999
We are at the (inaudible)
which is a neighborhood

00:52:15.000 --> 00:52:19.999
of about 90 kilns

00:52:20.000 --> 00:52:24.999
for brick makers. The total
amount of brick kilns

00:52:25.000 --> 00:52:29.999
in Ciudad Juarez is about 350.
What the program

00:52:30.000 --> 00:52:34.999
for pollution reduction aims is to have

00:52:35.000 --> 00:52:39.999
the brick makers to use
alternative fuels like LP gas,

00:52:40.000 --> 00:52:44.999
natural gas, or even,

00:52:45.000 --> 00:52:49.999
not so clean option, but it\'s the
better option economically sawdust.

00:52:50.000 --> 00:52:54.999
[sil.]

00:52:55.000 --> 00:52:59.999
The fields that the brick
makers had been accustomed

00:53:00.000 --> 00:53:04.999
at one point it used to be tires,

00:53:05.000 --> 00:53:09.999
not anymore at least Ciudad Juarez.
Other scrap material

00:53:10.000 --> 00:53:14.999
like palettes, cardboard,

00:53:15.000 --> 00:53:19.999
or wood sticks from some construction sites

00:53:20.000 --> 00:53:24.999
but at one point is whatever it
burns that\'s what you would use.

00:53:25.000 --> 00:53:29.999
These wooden crates

00:53:30.000 --> 00:53:34.999
that we see are illegal. Are illegal. Yes.

00:53:35.000 --> 00:53:39.999
They are illegal. Then as we
were being shown the newest

00:53:40.000 --> 00:53:44.999
and cleanest burning fuel or natural
gas a cloud of thick black smoke

00:53:45.000 --> 00:53:49.999
appeared a couple of blocks away.
Imagine how it was

00:53:50.000 --> 00:53:54.999
when there was tire burning.

00:53:55.000 --> 00:53:59.999
Families have very important
means of bringing the message

00:54:00.000 --> 00:54:04.999
because you as a brick maker
they had been breathing that

00:54:05.000 --> 00:54:09.999
for years and years and probably your
father did and your grandfather did

00:54:10.000 --> 00:54:14.999
and if I tell you that it\'s bad for your health, he says,
\"Well, no, look, I\'m okay.\" But if you tell them that

00:54:15.000 --> 00:54:19.999
their kids are breathing that and they\'re shown
that they\'re losing part of their brain,

00:54:20.000 --> 00:54:24.999
immediately they will listen to you.

00:54:25.000 --> 00:54:29.999
[sil.]

00:54:30.000 --> 00:54:34.999
In Juarez, the biggest
contributor to air pollution

00:54:35.000 --> 00:54:39.999
is the exhaust from automobiles.
Since 1993,

00:54:40.000 --> 00:54:44.999
the city is required that every car pass a test of
its exhaust system. And at the same time you can see

00:54:45.000 --> 00:54:49.999
the printout pass or not pass with
a sticker or without sticker,

00:54:50.000 --> 00:54:54.999
so we will see it.

00:54:55.000 --> 00:54:59.999
Okay, it shows that it doesn\'t pass

00:55:00.000 --> 00:55:04.999
and as you can see there\'s a
printout coming over there.

00:55:05.000 --> 00:55:09.999
Because 40% of cars fail the
test there is more help,

00:55:10.000 --> 00:55:14.999
a sbi-national partnership is established
pre-inspection diagnostic centers

00:55:15.000 --> 00:55:19.999
for car owners to get an evaluation and
advice from a technician. In the process,

00:55:20.000 --> 00:55:24.999
students are being trained
to become mechanics.

00:55:25.000 --> 00:55:29.999
Finally, we were off to see Juarez,
it\'s first modern landfill.

00:55:30.000 --> 00:55:34.999
Until 1994, this was the
site of uncontrolled burning

00:55:35.000 --> 00:55:39.999
now layers of garbage or compacted and covered with dirt
and a major source of air pollution has been eliminated.

00:55:40.000 --> 00:55:44.999
Several years ago when the
border environmental plan

00:55:45.000 --> 00:55:49.999
was drawn up between Mexico and the US

00:55:50.000 --> 00:55:54.999
in preparation for NAFTA, the border plan

00:55:55.000 --> 00:55:59.999
was put together

00:56:00.000 --> 00:56:04.999
on the border cities of
Washington DC and Mexico City.

00:56:05.000 --> 00:56:09.999
I think it\'s time that governmental
official start realizing that

00:56:10.000 --> 00:56:14.999
the solutions to the border have to come from the
border because we\'re the ones that are living with it,

00:56:15.000 --> 00:56:19.999
we\'re the ones that are familiar
with it, and we have the answers.

00:56:20.000 --> 00:56:24.999
Along the border there is
optimism and there is progress

00:56:25.000 --> 00:56:29.999
but there have also been setbacks. The North
American Free Trade Agreement established

00:56:30.000 --> 00:56:34.999
the NAD bank, it makes loans to border cities
so that they can build the infrastructure

00:56:35.000 --> 00:56:39.999
that should have come before
industrialization, drinking water plants,

00:56:40.000 --> 00:56:44.999
wastewater treatment plants,
and waste disposal facilities.

00:56:45.000 --> 00:56:49.999
The border environment cooperation commission
called it BECC a bi-national group

00:56:50.000 --> 00:56:54.999
with government and significantly
non-government members decides which projects

00:56:55.000 --> 00:56:59.999
the NAD bank will fund. Unfortunately,

00:57:00.000 --> 00:57:04.999
NAFTA does not provide money for cleaning
up existing hazardous waste contamination.

00:57:05.000 --> 00:57:09.999
There was a setback, in late 1994,

00:57:10.000 --> 00:57:14.999
11 months after NAFTA went into
effect, Mexico experienced

00:57:15.000 --> 00:57:19.999
a financial crisis. The peso lost over
half of its value against the US dollar,

00:57:20.000 --> 00:57:24.999
crippling inflation followed.

00:57:25.000 --> 00:57:29.999
The devalued peso has created a
building boom by foreign companies

00:57:30.000 --> 00:57:34.999
that has put increased pressure on
the environment. At the same time,

00:57:35.000 --> 00:57:39.999
pollution control projects in Mexico, including those
that might have been financed by NED bank loans

00:57:40.000 --> 00:57:44.999
have been scaled down or
put on hold, one example,

00:57:45.000 --> 00:57:49.999
a planned wastewater treatment
plant for Juarez, it\'s very first.

00:57:50.000 --> 00:57:54.999
We start building in 15 days before

00:57:55.000 --> 00:57:59.999
this economic collapse comes in Mexico.

00:58:00.000 --> 00:58:04.999
And we stopped all this

00:58:05.000 --> 00:58:09.999
new construction of this
wastewater treatment plants

00:58:10.000 --> 00:58:14.999
we tried to invest around $60 million

00:58:15.000 --> 00:58:19.999
only for this purpose.
And, well, everything now

00:58:20.000 --> 00:58:24.999
it\'s stopped but in the
environmental area impacts

00:58:25.000 --> 00:58:29.999
worse than the other areas.

00:58:30.000 --> 00:58:34.999
Why because, well, the
people try to survive first

00:58:35.000 --> 00:58:39.999
and later they\'re trying to do
something for the environment.

00:58:40.000 --> 00:58:44.999
More US owned companies now
obey the law and return

00:58:45.000 --> 00:58:49.999
their hazardous waste to the US for
disposal. But an estimated 44 tons a day

00:58:50.000 --> 00:58:54.999
or 30% is still disposed
of illegally in Mexico.

00:58:55.000 --> 00:58:59.999
You don\'t have a chance do it right. So…

00:59:00.000 --> 00:59:04.999
Those who hold the greatest power to improve the borders
environment or the people who run the factories there.

00:59:05.000 --> 00:59:09.999
At Becky\'s company makes circuit breakers.
He\'s chairman

00:59:10.000 --> 00:59:14.999
of the Western Maquiladora Trade
Association. He offers some hope.

00:59:15.000 --> 00:59:19.999
The great majority of my generation
or environmental people.

00:59:20.000 --> 00:59:24.999
I mean, I take my daughter
every year to Earth Day,

00:59:25.000 --> 00:59:29.999
my daughter\'s a card carrying member of
Greenpeace, okay? I\'m a member of the Sierra Club

00:59:30.000 --> 00:59:34.999
and that\'s how most of my the people of my
generation grew up. And in the incentive is that,

00:59:35.000 --> 00:59:39.999
\"Hey, that\'s the way to live your life and
that\'s the way to run your business.\"

00:59:40.000 --> 00:59:44.999
If you want to go to a
dollars and cents incentive,

00:59:45.000 --> 00:59:49.999
it just makes sense to do the
environmentally right thing

00:59:50.000 --> 00:59:54.999
because you\'re going to pay
dearly for it later if you don\'t.

00:59:55.000 --> 00:59:59.999
So there\'s financial reasons to do it, and there\'s
just common sense, I think, moral reasons to do it.

01:00:00.000 --> 01:00:04.999
What\'s the cost per barrel to return

01:00:05.000 --> 01:00:09.999
waste to United States? It\'s
very expensive. It depends

01:00:10.000 --> 01:00:14.999
what\'s in that barrel, of course, but
it can easily be for a 55-gallon drum

01:00:15.000 --> 01:00:19.999
anywhere from $500 to $900.

01:00:20.000 --> 01:00:24.999
Doesn\'t that create a real incentive

01:00:25.000 --> 01:00:29.999
to dispose of waste that we\'re going?
It doesn\'t

01:00:30.000 --> 01:00:34.999
create a real incentive to dispose of
waste illegally for me, and I don\'t think

01:00:35.000 --> 01:00:39.999
for most companies because if you dispose
of that if you take that $500 saving

01:00:40.000 --> 01:00:44.999
and dump it here in a few years, you
could look at a several million cleanup.

01:00:45.000 --> 01:00:49.999
So the math doesn\'t work out well for me.

01:00:50.000 --> 01:00:54.999
They\'ve got to catch you though. Well, they\'ve
got to catch you. Yup. I think there is

01:00:55.000 --> 01:00:59.999
a different attitude on the part of the Mexican
environmental regulatory agencies, primarily, because

01:01:00.000 --> 01:01:04.999
there was an effort made in the early \'90s
to really bring in some bright young people

01:01:05.000 --> 01:01:09.999
out of universities and even out
of industries who really do care

01:01:10.000 --> 01:01:14.999
about their country\'s environment and want to enforce
environmental laws, but they need the resources

01:01:15.000 --> 01:01:19.999
to be able to do that. And they need the
political will of the government to back them up

01:01:20.000 --> 01:01:24.999
when they do take a strong enforcement action.
Enforcement in Mexico of all laws including

01:01:25.000 --> 01:01:29.999
environmental ones has been compromised
by something everyone mentions

01:01:30.000 --> 01:01:34.999
but nobody likes to discuss,
corruption, bribery,

01:01:35.000 --> 01:01:39.999
la mordida, the Mexicans call it, the byte.

01:01:40.000 --> 01:01:44.999
Enforcement is diluted because

01:01:45.000 --> 01:01:49.999
of steps that are taken between the
industry and the governmental officials

01:01:50.000 --> 01:01:54.999
and they looked the other way. It\'s
unfortunate but that\'s a fact of life

01:01:55.000 --> 01:01:59.999
on the border. And this is
something that we deal with,

01:02:00.000 --> 01:02:04.999
and we have to contend with. Again,

01:02:05.000 --> 01:02:09.999
we have a new breed officials
in Mexico in general,

01:02:10.000 --> 01:02:14.999
but we definitely have a new
breed of local officials

01:02:15.000 --> 01:02:19.999
since you have Juarez that
don\'t have this attitude,

01:02:20.000 --> 01:02:24.999
and they have shown and demonstrated to all of
us that they do take enforcement very seriously.

01:02:25.000 --> 01:02:29.999
It\'s not easy to deal with this problem of

01:02:30.000 --> 01:02:34.999
corruption because the problem
of corruption stands from

01:02:35.000 --> 01:02:39.999
and a whole life in this
country, it\'s not easy.

01:02:40.000 --> 01:02:44.999
I think, it\'s something
that this administration

01:02:45.000 --> 01:02:49.999
tried to fight, and it\'s
was successful team

01:02:50.000 --> 01:02:54.999
the corruption now here, at
least, in the local authorities

01:02:55.000 --> 01:02:59.999
is something like part of the past.

01:03:00.000 --> 01:03:04.999
In Juarez encouragement comes
in the form of lapel pins

01:03:05.000 --> 01:03:09.999
and street corner signs with this logo.
Twenty years ago there were problems

01:03:10.000 --> 01:03:14.999
and those problems, some of
those problems continued today.

01:03:15.000 --> 01:03:19.999
Mexico is written environmental law, it\'s a very
good, very strong, it\'s very complicated law

01:03:20.000 --> 01:03:24.999
very similar to the one in the United States would have
taken all the steps in the right direction. And yes,

01:03:25.000 --> 01:03:29.999
enforcement has been a problem. First
came the law, now comes the enforcement,

01:03:30.000 --> 01:03:34.999
they\'re hiring inspectors,
they\'re training inspectors,

01:03:35.000 --> 01:03:39.999
and enforcement will grow and
increase over the coming years

01:03:40.000 --> 01:03:44.999
and make those problem people. I hate to say
it, but if that\'s the reason they\'re in Mexico

01:03:45.000 --> 01:03:49.999
than what they\'re gonna do is they\'re gonna move to
another country that doesn\'t have environmental laws.

01:03:50.000 --> 01:03:55.000
[sil.]