Mexico is strengthening its environmental policy framework through LGEEPA modernization, circular economy implementation, ecosystem restoration, and national reforestation efforts. The changes could increase environmental compliance and investment requirements for infrastructure, energy, manufacturing, forestry, real estate, and waste management, while reinforcing coordination among government, businesses, and communities.
Alicia Bárcena, Minister of Environment and Natural Resources (SEMARNAT), says that the agency will promote the strengthening of Mexico’s environmental legal framework to address the challenges facing the country in ecosystem restoration and conservation. During the Third Thematic Meeting on Conservation and Restoration of the National Association of State Environmental Authorities (ANAAE), held in Ensenada, Baja California, Bárcena warned that the country’s current environmental challenges must be addressed collectively.
“Restoration and conservation are no longer secondary policies. Biodiversity, pollution, and climate change are intrinsically connected,” said Bárcena. The relationship among these three factors is referred to as the triple planetary crisis, a concept that recognizes the interconnection between climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution. These challenges do not occur in isolation: climate change degrades ecosystems and alters their natural cycles; biodiversity loss reduces nature’s capacity to capture carbon, regulate the climate, and provide essential services; while pollution degrades air, water, and soil, further weakening ecosystem resilience.
This interconnection also means that actions addressing one of these crises can help reduce the others. The conservation and restoration of healthy ecosystems strengthen biodiversity, contribute to climate change mitigation and adaptation, and help reduce the impacts of pollution, while also sustaining essential ecosystem services for communities and productive activities. Therefore, addressing the triple planetary crisis requires comprehensive environmental policies that tackle its causes and effects simultaneously.
Modernizing Mexico’s Environmental Framework
In this context, Bárcena stressed the importance of consolidating a national agenda in which nature is considered economic infrastructure and highlighted the modernization of the General Law of Ecological Balance and Environmental Protection (LGEEPA) as one of the priorities for strengthening the country’s environmental policy.
Last week, the National Forum for the Modernization of the LGEEPA was held, bringing together federal authorities, legislators, specialists, academia, and civil society organizations to discuss a comprehensive transformation of the country’s main environmental law, which has been in force since 1988.
Participants proposed that the modernization should strengthen the prevention of environmental damage, ecosystem restoration, climate resilience, biodiversity conservation, and environmental governance, while incorporating digital tools for environmental monitoring and management. The proposal also seeks to expand public participation, strengthen environmental justice, and align Mexico’s legal framework with its international commitments, with implications for sectors subject to environmental regulation and permitting.
Moreover, Bárcena highlighted that the new General Law on Circular Economy is one of President Claudia Sheinbaum’s priorities and noted that work has already begun with tire manufacturers and companies in the rubber sector to promote tire recycling and prevent used tires from becoming sources of pollution.
In Morelos, 13 municipalities participate in the collection and management of these waste materials, while private-sector companies such as Cementos Moctezuma use the processed material to generate energy. The initiative represents an example of collaboration between governments and companies to transition from a model based on extracting, producing, and discarding materials toward one that prioritizes reuse, recycling, and material recovery.
Cementos Moctezuma’s Circular Economy Center for Tire Transformation in Morelos has the capacity to process up to 3,000 tons of tires per month, equivalent to approximately 200,000 end-of-life tires. The materials are used as an energy source in cement production, contributing to emissions reductions and more efficient waste recovery. The company aims to replace 30% of its fossil fuel consumption with alternative fuels by 2030.
Bárcena emphasized that SEMARNAT’s actions on restoration, rehabilitation, remediation, and environmental cleanup seek to protect Mexico’s biodiversity, prevent further biodiversity loss, address the effects of pollution, and tackle climate change. She also called for development projects to incorporate restoration and conservation measures and said that SEMARNAT is promoting initiatives under which companies accompany their investments with proposals for environmental compensation funds.
Mexico Launches National Reforestation Campaign
On Aug. 9, the Government of Mexico launched the 2026 National Reforestation Campaign, which for the first time was carried out simultaneously across all 32 states. The initiative aims to plant 6.6 million trees and plants and one million seeds across 32,184ha, with a long-term goal of producing and planting 1.5 billion plants, trees, and seeds by 2030.
President Sheinbaum led the launch of the campaign in Puebla and recalled that eight years ago, with the beginning of the Fourth Transformation, the government launched the Sembrando Vida program, which to date has contributed to the reforestation of more than 1.5 billion trees of different species.
The president also signed a decree designating the second Sunday of August each year as National Reforestation Day, administered the oath to the country’s Environmental Defenders, and witnessed a demonstration of agricultural drones that will be used to disperse seeds in hard-to-reach areas.
In Mexico City, Clara Brugada, Head of Government, led the planting of 35,000 trees and announced that the next program to be launched will focus on urban trees in the city’s most challenging areas. “We announced that we have prohibited the production of genetically modified corn in Mexico City and that we are close to eliminating illegal logging in the Bosque de Agua in the southern part of Mexico City, also with the support of federal forces,” Brugada said.
Brugada also noted that over the past eight years, more than 400,000 farmers and community members have reforested more than 1.5 billion trees as part of environmental conservation efforts across the country.
During the ceremony, Rosaura Ruiz, Minister of Science, Humanities, Technology and Innovation (SECIHTI), said reforestation is one of the most relevant measures to address climate change and stressed the importance of planting species appropriate for each region. She also announced that communities will receive support to develop ecotourism initiatives aimed at protecting and conserving the environment.
Additionally, during the First Ordinary Session of the 2026 Metropolitan Development Council of the Valley of Mexico, Brugada called for stronger metropolitan governance to jointly address the region’s main environmental challenges, including forest protection, integrated water management, air quality, and climate action.
The Brugada also said water governance must be managed at the metropolitan level because the states share the same watershed, aquifers, rainfall patterns, and risks associated with land-use change. She added that air quality and the right to breathe clean air can only be guaranteed when authorities act as a single region.
Brugada proposed developing a Metropolitan Mobility and Climate Action Plan, as well as organizing a large-scale metropolitan reforestation campaign along state boundaries to strengthen ecological connectivity and expand forest coverage in the eastern part of the Valley of Mexico.
During the session, several agreements were also approved to strengthen regional coordination. These included modifications to the Metropolitan Area of the Valley of Mexico, which now comprises 84 municipalities and boroughs, including the municipality of Huitzilac, Morelos, for the first time; the formal incorporation of the Government of Morelos into the Council; and the launch of a public consultation to update the Metropolitan Planning Program for the Valley of Mexico.