Yuvelis Natalia Morales Blanco, a Colombian environmental advocate, received her first death threat at 19. Now 23, Morales Blanco, the public face of the country’s youth-led fight against fracking, finds herself at a crucial intersection: Not only does she live in the most dangerous country in the world to be an environmental leader, but also, according to a 2021 global survey , she belongs to an age group disproportionately affected by the psychological burdens of the climate crisis — a crisis that, in turn, will hit rural communities in the Global South like hers the hardest. Colombia has been embroiled in a fierce debate over the future of fossil fuel extraction, specifically whether to utilize fracking or hydraulic fracturing, the process of injecting a high-pressure liquid into rocks to extract oil or gas.
In 2019, then-President Iván Duque announced four pilot projects to determine fracking’s viability on a large scale — two of which were slated for Morales Blanco’s hometown, Puerto Wilches, a small community in the country’s northeast corner on the banks of the Magdalena River. Attempts to ban the practice have failed in Congress, and although the projects are at a temporary standstill, they could restart if political winds shift in the 2026 presidential election. In an interview, Morales Blanco, the daughter of a fisherman, details her fight to stop fracking in Puerto Wilches and nationwide, her struggles with mental health following years of persistent .