Azul Celebrates Biden Executive Orders Committing U.S. to Bold Ocean-Climate Action
January 27, 2021 – Today, President Biden signed a comprehensive set of Executive Orders aimed to advance ambitious — and deeply needed — protections of our country’s natural resources and biodiversity. Azul has long advocated and fought for conservation of our nation’s resources, rooted in the values and principles of environmental justice.
The Biden Administration’s 30×30 order pledges to conserve 30 percent of the country’s land and coastal waters, a strategy backed by science to help slow the loss of biodiversity, mitigate the impacts of a rapidly warming climate, and ensure all people across the United States — no matter their economic status, race, or ethnicity, have access to nature.
We celebrate this commitment, a 10-year goal pledging to conserve 30 percent of land and waters that can help solve our climate crises. Equally, we see the moratorium on federal offshore oil and gas drilling as a vital opportunity to fix this nation’s broken leasing system. Additionally, Azul celebrates the administration’s order to halt oil and gas leasing on federal lands and waters — a welcome relief following the Trump Administration’s 2018 proposal to open the west coast to new offshore oil and gas leases for the first time in 30 years.
The following is a statement from Marce Gutiérrez-Graudiņš, Founder and Executive Director of Azul, a grassroots organization working with Latinxs to conserve coasts and oceans, on these historic orders:
“For too long, the consequences of natural resource extraction and pollution in the United States have fallen disproportionately on low income and communities of color. Azul has long advocated that the pursuit of a 30×30 goal must address this historic inequity to ensure that everyone has access to nature and its benefits. We are excited to see equity at the heart of this executive order — by including equity and access in this manner, President Biden is protecting nature WITH people, not from them. Enhorabuena!”
“The coast belongs to the people, it was made for you and me. Our government is duty-bound to safeguard our coasts and oceans for the benefit of everybody, not oil company stockholders – so it is especially important to see safeguards introduced, like this Biden executive order today. An overwhelming majority of Californians oppose allowing more drilling off our coast, and this executive order reflects protections for our coasts, our economy, and our way of life.”
Background: Azul has long advocated for a national 30×30 order rooted in equity, positioning environmental justice at the core for a people-oriented approach. This 30×30 initiative is innovative because it centers both.
In October 2020, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed an Executive Order aimed at protecting California’s natural resources and biodiversity. The order pledged to conserve 30 percent of the state’s land and coastal waters, historically making the Golden State the first in the nation to lead on “30×30” land and water conservation. Azul led a collaborative in advocating for and centering environmental justice and equity in this executive order to protect 30 percent of California’s land and coastal waters by California’s coastal economy is a blue engine that generates over 23 billion dollars and 400,000 jobs per year from the tourism, recreation and fishing sectors alone.