Hummingbirds, they are not the solution, but they can be part of it

When we overcome the challenge of the pandemic by Covid-19, the economic, social and environmental crisis that we have been dragging along for decades will continue. We will open the doors to find endless problems which, far from finding a solution, have worsened.

Once we leave the current contingency behind, we must find innovative solutions and integral which have a positive effect long-term.

The answers must start from new approaches that conceive of society as a complex and interconnected entity, that is to say that we must seek alternatives that promote social cohesion, the economy, well-being and respect for the environment parallel.

In 2018, during my campaign for Senate, I chose as my cause the bee protection, one of pollinators whose life depends on the planet and which is threatened with extinction.

In recent days, I have joined the hummingbirds for this cause. But it is not only a question of pollinators, it is also a question of protecting the environment, strengthening the social fabric, having decent housing and creating the conditions not only to have a future, but also to provide to future generations a better destiny.

Of 330 species of hummingbirds that exist in the world, 58 are in Mexico and eight live in Yucatán, for this reason, in collaboration with the group Proyecto Santa María, I took the task of promoting the placement of urban gardens for pollinators in the colonies of Mérida, the capital of the state that I represent proudly in Congress.

With these actions, I do not only want to raise awareness about the protection of pollinators and offer them a refuge from the threat of an increasingly polluted environment.

In addition, this project represents a means of creating public spaces of coexistence in which the participation of families, in the placement and maintenance of plants, encourages the reconstruction of the social fabric.

As part of the first day of spring, families in the Santa Fe subdivision in Mérida have placed the first 22 trees that will provide shelter and food for pollinators and will be a magnet for their attraction and reproduction.

I am convinced that we must give back to nature what we took from it, and in doing so we will give a new opportunity to reinvent ourselves as a society and create spaces of consciousness, coexistence and well-being.

I also think that citizens are aware of this, since so far 300 families have expressed their desire to participate in this project. It is no coincidence, citizens expect the authorities to think beyond the circumstances, to find answers that translate into real and convincing facts.

The action of popular representatives, whether political, social, electoral or in the exercise of their functions, must be built by citizens and with citizens.

For the Mayans, hummingbirds were a symbol of the embodiment of the soul of warriors, and today, our struggle must be waged in union with men and with nature.

* Senator of the Republic of the state of Zacatecas, representing the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI)

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