HAZla por tu Ola, a Peruvian Society for Environmental Law - SPDA campaign, was the winner in the Oceans category of the Seventh Edition of the Latinoamerica Verde Awards category. This campaign was selected out of 2540 projects submitted by 25 countries during a ceremony that took place last Saturday during a live transmission.
“This award is an acknowledgement to all the people that have supported the campaign since 2015. This gives us the strength and energy to keep working for the protection of surf breaks and marine ecosystems. Furthermore, it shows us that, if we unite, if we get organized and take action, we can generate meaningful changes”, remarks Carolina Butrich, environmental engineer and coordinator of the initiative.
To this date, through the work done with HAZla por tu Ola, which has the support of institutions like the National Surfing Federation (Fenta) and diverse surfer groups, we have managed to legally protect 33 waves throughout the Peruvian coast. “We want to protect 10 more waves this year so that we can reach 2030 with 100 protected waves”, says Butrich.
The protection of waves occurs through their inscription in the National Registry of Surf Breaks, a motion covered in Law 27280 for the Preservation of Surf Breaks Appropriated for the Practice of Sports, the first legal system specifically created for the protection of waves in the world. However, in order to protect each wave, technical studies must be undertaken, which may have high costs. HAZla por tu Ola’s is an innovative crowdfunding and crowdsourcing platform that recollects funds and talent from citizens, organizations and enterprises to cover the costs of the bathymetric studies needed to register and protect our waves.
As the first country with a law specifically created to protect surf breaks, this campaign promotes the protection of waves around the world. Chilean surfer collectives are currently working on the approval of the also name Surf Breaks Law in their country, which is based on the framework of Law 27280. HAZla por tu Ola’s next goal is to form a wave conservation network across Latin America.
There were 4 Peruvian projects that made it to the finals in this edition of the Latinoamérica Verde Awards. The other winner of the night was Ecoahorro, tu crédito inteligente (Ecoahorro, your intelligent credit), in the Sustainable Finances category. This shows that the work on environmental issues in Peru is ever growing and is recognized at international level.
