Pati Ruiz describes some of the environmental problems of the Sierra Gorda:

Our region is an extreme poverty area in central Mexico with very strong problems because of the bad use of the resources, for generations. [There has been] a tremendous logging that is leaving our watersheds naked – very deep slopes, and naked with a loss of soil – of millions of tons every year, right in front of our eyes.

Our streams diminishing. Last year, during the worst drought season, we have had since [for]ever, I guess. We had hundreds of communities without a drop of water. Sometimes during the dry season, the people have to walk for two hours to get some water last year – even walking five hours. We had no water.

Yeah, but climate change – it's a fact in the Sierra Gorda. When we started planting trees 12 years ago, we had a survival [rate] of 95 percent. You may see it – our wonderful plantations for the first six years, and it has been diminishing. And last year, we had a survival [rate] of 13 percent after a freeze, a drought, and the fires – and we lost half of the plantations that we [planted] for years. We have planted 3 million trees – it means 3,000 hectares – now, maybe we have one thousand.

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