04 Nov Analysis of Presidential Programs Reveals Lack of Proposals on Sustainability, Fisheries Management, and Coastal Governance
A report from the Millennium Institute SECOS revealed some consensus on water infrastructure and permit streamlining, but major gaps in sustainability, marine resource governance, and coastal ecosystem protection. Only two presidential candidates include concrete measures on climate change, while five present no proposals for fisheries management.
Less than a month before Chile’s upcoming presidential elections, the Millennium Institute for Coastal Socio-Ecology (SECOS), through its Public Policy Observatory, published the 2025 Report: Commitments of Presidential Candidates on Small-Scale Fisheries, Aquaculture, and Coastal Development. The document analyzed the available programs of seven candidates, focusing on issues relevant to coastal socio-ecology. The study identified 89 commitments across nine categories, revealing a strong prioritization of seawater desalination and permit streamlining, contrasted with a low presence of proposals related to ecosystem conservation, climate change, and the management of hydrobiological resources.
The analysis conducted by SECOS’ Science and Public Policy Unit shows that water infrastructure is the most cross-cutting category, with seawater desalination as the dominant axis. Candidates Evelyn Matthei and Jeannette Jara concentrate the main commitments through proposals for multipurpose plants, a National Desalination Plan, and logistical works such as ports and bioceanic corridors.
Francisca Reyes, academic at the UC Institute for Sustainable Development and researcher at the Millennium Institute SECOS, explains that the consensus around desalination reflects broad agreement on the need to address it. “In this sense, the fact that there is consensus on advancing desalination reflects a longstanding debate in Chile and a now widespread political agreement on its necessity as a response to the climate crisis and its effects on water security—positioning it as a politically viable and priority adaptation strategy,” said Reyes.
Regarding environmental governance, the candidates agree on the need to reduce bureaucratic delays, though they differ on the role of the state. While Matthei proposes to “eliminate overregulation” and create a Strategic Projects Office, Jara advocates for the implementation of the Framework Law on Sectoral Permits with early citizen participation and decentralization. Kaiser and Kast propose structural reforms to the institutional model, while Artés suggests restricting industrial exploitation of the sea in favor of state and local cooperatives.
However, the largest differences appear in the categories linked to sustainability and environmental governance. On climate change, only two candidates (Matthei and Harold Mayne-Nicholls) present specific commitments, such as ocean governance, territorial adaptation, and updated NDCs. Parisi mentions climate education, while four other candidates include no proposals at all in this area.
Gaps in Fisheries Management and Climate Policy
Biodiversity protection is also absent in most programs: only Matthei, Parisi, and Artés explicitly address the conservation of strategic ecosystems. The remaining candidates omit measures for wetlands, glaciers, microplastics, or marine-coastal areas.
The most critical category is Management of Hydrobiological Resources: only two commitments were identified, both limited to strengthening environmental enforcement (Matthei and Mayne-Nicholls), with no strategies for fisheries management, territorial governance, or quota allocation. In tourism, only Jeannette Jara presented specific proposals on coastal development and regional diversification.
Asked about the lack of commitments on hydrobiological resource management and climate change, Reyes suggests that these are “highly sensitive areas, tied to distributive conflicts among actors with economic and territorial power (industrial fishing sector, small-scale fisheries, and coastal communities), and to regulations currently under discussion (the draft Fisheries Law), which undoubtedly makes any position more complex during an electoral campaign.” She adds that, since institutions and instruments are already in place, “the debate requires a more technical level of discussion and is probably considered less urgent to include explicitly in current electoral programs, which tend to be minimalist and general.”
To prevent coastal governance from focusing solely on infrastructure projects, Reyes emphasizes that the next government must strengthen small-scale fisheries and aquaculture as pillars of food security and territorial sustainability. She also notes the need to consolidate environmental and fisheries institutions under an intersectoral logic, and to regulate the socio-environmental impacts of emerging industries such as desalination and deep-sea mining.
To achieve these objectives, the director of the SECOS Public Policy Unit considers it “essential” to advance toward “integrated coastal zone planning aligned with the ecosystem-based approach of the proposed Coastal Law, and consistent with Chile’s international commitments to ocean and marine-coastal ecosystem protection; to complete the processing of the new General Fisheries Law and aquaculture reforms; and to strengthen coordination between ocean, climate, and biodiversity policies, among other priorities.”