📋 Tender Overview
The purpose of the project is "the identification, protection, preservation and registration of the breakers suitable for sports practice, which constitute the natural space (...)".
The Senate approved and sent to the Chamber of Deputies the bill on the protection of wave breaks for surfing , an initiative authored by Senator Luz Ebensperger and Senators José Miguel Durana, Francisco Chahuán, Rafael Prohens and Kenneth Pugh.
The objective of the proposal is the “identification, protection, preservation and registration of breakers suitable for sports practice, which constitute the natural space suitable for the practice of sports that involve any type of wave riding.”
During the debate -in which senators José Miguel Durana , Gustavo Sanhueza , Sebastián Keitel , Iván Moreira and Alfonso De Urresti intervened- the importance of the advance that "makes the breakers visible as a unit" was stressed and it was noted that currently The only regulated breakers are those within nature sanctuaries and protected areas.
Along these lines, it was also emphasized that sport is compatible with the environment and it was called to consider the project that modifies law No. 19,300, on General Environmental Bases, regarding the protection of coastal zones ( bulletin 15,513- 12 ), so that it “dialogues” with the approved text.
It should be noted that Senator Gustavo Sanhueza requested a separate vote on some articles because, in his opinion, they “redundant” what was already established in the Water Code.
DEFINITIONS
However, definitions were supported for the application of the law, which means:
a) Breaker : Area where the waves generated by the wind interact with the seabed, increasing their height until they reach the breaking point, after which they continue to dissipate as they propagate.
b) Breaker Suitable for Sports Practice : Breaker that can be used by an athlete, since it runs consistently in one or both directions gradually, allowing it to slide.
c) Characteristics of the Breaker : Physical components of the breaker that give it its shape and function, since they determine the wave breaking process when interacting with it, such as the seabed, the swell, the bathymetry, the sedimentation processes, sea currents and wind.
d) Breaker Affectation : Action that is produced by any activity unrelated to the acts of nature, which alters, deforms, reduces and/or eliminates the characteristics of the breaker and/or the qualities of the breaker.
SURF
It is also specified that the wave breaks that occur along the entire coast of Chile, without exception, are the inalienable and imprescriptible property of the State of Chile.
The Chilean Navy, through the General Directorate of the Maritime Territory, is the entity in charge of supervising and authorizing the practice of various nautical sports, promoting their practice, verifying the characteristics of wave breaks, implementing safety measures and the regulatory measures that it deems pertinent for the holding of national and international competitions of this type of sports.
Likewise, the project proposes that the Ministry of Sports, through the National Sports Institute, coordinate its activities with the General Directorate of the Maritime Territory, the Regional Governments, and Sports Associations, dedicated to the practice of any of the sports modalities that involve ride waves, will be able to promote and develop, within the framework of their own functions, studies and identification and research programs related to the need to conserve wave breakers suitable for sports practice.
Finally, it is stipulated that any activity, proposal, design or execution of public or private works that implies the intervention or affectation of an area that has waves or wave breakers, suitable for practicing the sport of surfing waves, in any of its modalities, must consider the reports prepared by the Ministry of Sport, in exercise of its faculties, for the purposes of its conservation.
