Central America becomes junkyard for used US cars

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TEGUCIGALPA - Impoverished Central America has become a huge junk yard for used American cars, helping bring the regional environment to the brink of collapse, an environmental official said on Friday.


Marco Gonzalez, head of environment for a regional integration body known as SICA, said the polluting, gas-guzzling juggernauts were responsible for high levels of carbon monoxide and other contaminants that afflict Honduras, Guatemala, Nicaragua, El Salvador and Costa Rica.
"Central America has become a junkyard for cars from the United States," Gonzalez said in Tegucigalpa, the Honduran capital.

Because used cars are far cheaper than new ones, old vehicles from the United States are imported by many Central American countries in large numbers and used not just by private owners but also for public transport.

Central America, where millions of people get by on as little as $2 a day, also imports large quantities of used clothes, shoes and electrical appliances from the United States.

Gonzalez said the polluting ancient vehicles, combined with fast rates of deforestation, forest fires and chaotic waste disposal, were endangering the regional ecology.

"If the governments of the region don't adopt opportune measures, in 15 years we Central Americans will be suffering serious levels of contamination of our air and water," he said.

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