Environmental restrictions at Atitlán: Decree 64-97 and CONAP
- Tourism, hospitality and residency
- Environmental licensing and protected areas
- Audited
Decree 64-97 (6-Aug-1997) declares the Lake Atitlán basin a Multiple Use Reserve Protected Area: ≈625 km² (the lake 130 km²), administered by the national protected areas council (CONAP) under its master plan. Management zones (article 4): multiple use 139.8 km² (25%, settlements and agriculture), recovery 72.1 km², forest management 30.3 km², archaeological-cultural 76.1 km², extensive use (the lake), protective forest 147 km² and primitive 29.3 km² (the volcanic cones). Article 9 orders the prevention of 'industries or potentially polluting activities, as well as works that may cause a significant alteration of ecological conditions'. Under article 20 of the Protected Areas Act (Decree 4-89), any firm with commercial or tourism activities inside a protected area must sign a contract 'by mutual agreement with CONAP', on conditions 'determined by an environmental impact study' compatible with the master plan. No municipal ordinance from 2024-26 on shoreline construction was found, nor any branded hotel pipeline on the lake.
The research is written in English; quoted figures, source names and the titles of legal instruments stay in the language their source published them in.
Figures
- RUMCLA area
- ≈625 km² (lake 130 km²)
- Multiple use zone
- 139.8 km² (25%)
- Requirement to operate
- contract with CONAP + EIA
Caveat
Sources
Related records
This layer is research: read from public sources by the archive's own team, every claim cited with the date it was consulted, and audited where it is marked so. It has not entered the verified store — no figure here was fetched back from its source or stamped with a retrieval time — so it wears no red provenance numeral and never mixes with the verified figures.