Yuvelis Natalia Morales is one of the most important young voices in the Colombian environmental movement. The 22-year-old fights against fracking and advocates for the protection of important wetlands in the region of her birthplace. Morales is from Puerto Wilches, a town on the Magdalena River in Colombia’s northern province of Santander. Despite a nationwide ban on fracking that has been in effect since 2018, fracking pilot projects have been launched in this same region. Pilot projects such as that of local energy company Ecopetrol in the Magdalena Valley remain exempt from the ban to this day. This prompted Yuveli’s Natalia Morales to found a youth activist group protesting fracking projects in Colombia.
The young Colombian woman is now known outside Colombia as an anti-fracking activist. Morales is a member of the Committee for the Defense of Water, Life and Territory of Puerto Wilches (AguaWil), the Alianza Colombia Libre de Fracking, and a winner of the French human rights and environmental activist award „Initiative Marianne.“
Like many other activists, she is persecuted and threatened because of her tireless commitment in her home country and had to flee Colombia temporarily.