Initiative Raises Money to Keep Oil Companies out of Ecuador The
Yasuni-ITT Initiative has been called many things:
controversial, ecological blackmail, revolutionary, pioneering,
and the best chance to keep oil companies out of Ecuador's
Yasuni National Park. But now, after a number of ups and downs,
the program is beginning to make good: the Yasuni-ITT Initiative
has raised $300 million, according to the Guardian, or 8 percent
of the total amount needed to fully fund the idea. The program,
which is the first of its kind, proposes to leave an estimated
850 million barrels of oil untouched in Yasuni National Park if
donors worldwide compensate Ecuador for about half of the worth
of the oil: $3.6 billion. The money would keep oil companies out
of 200,000 hectares known as the Ishpingo-Tambococha-Tiputinin
(ITT) blocs. The money doesn't go directly to the Ecuador
government, but instead to a United Nations Development Fund
(UNDF) which will be used to fund green energy projects,
conservation initiatives, refore