00:00Colombian environmentalism is in mourning; one of its founding fathers has just passed away.
00:05Julio Carrizosa Umaña died at the age of 91.
00:09key in the creation of more than a dozen national parks
00:12and in the publication of the world's first Natural Resources Code,
00:16who was also a columnist for El Espectador for several years.
00:20Alegría Fonseca, a renowned Colombian environmentalist and a close friend of Carrizosa,
00:25It recalls the vital role it played decades ago in protecting Tairona Park.
00:29when they wanted to build a hotel complex,
00:32someone who always thought about the collective good, as Fonseca defines him.
00:37I believe that Julio has been an intellectual and environmental role model for Colombia.
00:47of work for natural resources, from every point of view.
00:52Julio is a wise man, definitely.
00:56Carrizosa Umaña was born in Bogotá in May 1935.
01:00In 1952 he graduated from the modern gymnasium and seven years later he graduated from the National University as an engineer
01:07civil.
01:08In 1969, after completing his postgraduate studies abroad and directing the National Cadastre,
01:14He began a period in which he was at the head of several institutions in the country,
01:18from where he led several of the advances that are most remembered today.
01:22Between 1969 and 1973 he directed the IGAC, and between 1973 and 1978 the now-defunct Inderena.
01:30During his time at IGAC, he was the key architect in the creation of 17 national parks,
01:36six flora and fauna sanctuaries,
01:38as well as in the publication of the National Code of Renewable Natural Resources and Environmental Protection,
01:45considered the world's first natural resources code.
01:49After his time in Colombian state entities,
01:52Carrizosa spent the next 15 years advising national and international entities
01:57such as ECLAC, Colciencias, the IDB and the OAS.
02:01His career also includes time spent at different universities in the country.
02:06Between 1969 and 1978 he was dean of faculties at national universities
02:12and then assumed the directorship of the Institute of Environmental Studies at the National University of Colombia.
02:17In 2014, after his retirement, Carrizosa Humana intensified an aspect he had already been working on,
02:24the writer's.
02:25In addition to being a columnist for El Espectador for nearly a decade,
02:29He was the author and co-author of more than 10 books, among which stand out Colombia complejo,
02:33The atmosphere in the discussion of peace and How to live in a complex world, one of his latest works.
02:39According to Sandra Bilardi, professor at the University of the Andes and columnist for this newspaper,
02:45Julio Carrizosa was a pioneer when environmental management decisions did not yet exist.
02:50Although we had botanists and zoologists in the country,
02:54Bilardi says that we didn't have people in charge of thinking about and designing environmental management
02:59and of the territories of this country.
03:02It was Carrizosa who started all the genius of complex thought.
03:06In fact, for many academics, he was the one who taught us to see Colombia in a complex way.
03:13I believe that Julio was always a very humble man, despite his genius.
03:18He was a man who always had a profile of listening, of proposing.
03:24Throughout his writings and conversations, Carrizosa insisted on this view,
03:30as he explained from the late 1990s,
03:33It is based on a philosophical and scientific approach
03:36who insists on preparing, with the greatest possible courage, a non-reductionist and non-simplistic vision,
03:42explicit and conscious, in which it is accepted that we live in a world full of variables and interrelationships,
03:49that our vision is nothing different from a subjective perception,
03:52and that what we call cause is always the effect of something else that is in turn interrelated with
03:59other variables.
04:00The combination of his experience in various state entities,
04:04his travels across the country and his training as an engineer,
04:08His ideas remain relevant in current environmental debates.
04:13I have dedicated most of my life to understanding why a country like Colombia
04:19has not been able to achieve the well-being of less wealthy nations,
04:22Carrizosa Omaña wrote in Colombia Compleja.
04:25I think a fundamental recommendation is that Colombians try to understand what kind of country we live in.
04:36Let us not be influenced by those who see the country only from a simplistic perspective,
04:44from an economic and a political perspective.
04:46Viewing reality also taking into account other human objectives
04:51that have to do with other issues such as kindness, such as aesthetics,
04:57such as creativity, such as knowledge.
04:59If you want to read more about the legacy of one of the fathers of environmentalism in Colombia,
05:04Don't forget to visit the Spectator's Environment section.
