Ecuador tries novel balance of oil and environment

Correa wants wealthy nations to pay Ecuador $350 million a year in exchange for leaving an estimated 1 billion barrels of oil under the ground in the pristine Yasuni rainforest.

"I think oil has brought us more bad than good," said Correa during a recent visit to the bustling Amazonian oil town of El Coca. "We need to do something about it."

Environmentalists around the world have celebrated the idea, apparently the first of its kind, as a way to preserve a delicate environment without creating an economic burden for the cash-strapped nation where six in ten people are poor.

The move come amid growing popularity of "carbon offsetting," in which first-world residents concerned about climate change make donations to compensate for the environmental damage their consumer habits cause.

But critics wonder if the politically unstable Ecuador, which relies on oil for nearly half of its export revenues, can keep this promise to the international community or whether authorities are trying to have their cake and eat it too.

CLIMATE CHANGE

The plan involves creating a trust fund for donations or accepting debt pardons from other countries or multilateral lenders like the International Monetary Fund.

The $350 million would constitute about half the annual revenues Ecuador thinks it could make from extracting oil from the field, partly located inside the 2.4 million-acre (982,000-hectare) Yasuni National Park.

Former energy minister Alberto Acosta has pointed out that all the oil in the Ishpingo-Tambococha-Tiputini field would only be enough for 12 days of global crude consumption.