The National Government, through the Colombian Agricultural Institute (ICA), announced this Thursday the adoption of exceptional measures for the evacuation and mobilization of production and work animals in risk areas due to the activity of the Nevado del Ruiz Volcano.
In this sense, the ICA issued the External Circular number 01-2023through which it makes known the guidelines that will be applied within the framework of disaster risk management measures in the event of an eventual evacuation due to the situation that occurs in the areas of influence of the Nevado del Ruiz Volcano.
These are measures aimed at protecting the lives of animals and guaranteeing the sustainability of agricultural production in that area of the country.
Among the announced measures, it is worth noting that farmers, producers and marketers will have priority and urgent attention for the issuance of Internal Mobilization Sanitary Guides so that they can move with their animals from the producing farms to destination farms or temporary shelters.
Said process will be verified by the ICA immediately with the emergency care committees of the villages and municipalities.
Likewise, in the ICA Circular, it explains that only in the event of a red alert due to the activity of the Nevado del Ruiz Volcano, the mobility of animals can be carried out without the Sanitary Guide for Internal Mobilization.
In addition, the ICA authorizes the provisional lifting of blockades to the mobilization of properties of origin that are located in areas where preventive (orange alert) or emergency (red alert) evacuation is required.
Availability of technical staff
In the same document, the ICA indicates that in the event of a possible evacuation that involves the mobilization of animals, the entity will guarantee the technical and support staff to support these procedures.
In this way, the National Government complies with the tasks announced this Wednesday by the Presidential Adviser for the Regions, Luis Fernando Velasco, who in a statement indicated that measures would be taken to protect livestock and birds that belong to families in the high-risk area, as some people refuse to evacuate for fear of losing the animals from which they derive their livelihood.
“Near the volcano there are farms and on those farms the peasants have cows, horses, cattle, goats and poultry, and that somehow prevents them from moving and carrying out preventive evacuation,” Velasco explained at the time.
Finally, it should be remembered that President Gustavo Petro asked the Departmental and Municipal Councils for Risk Management to accelerate the preventive evacuation of 2,500 families that are at high risk due to the contingency of Nevado del Ruiz.