"What is funded and what is abandoned?: environmental budget"

Collab: Carolina Somoza, B.A. in Political Science (University of Buenos Aires), holds diplomas in Environmental Law, the Rights of Migrants and Refugees, and Comprehensive Environmental Education. Teacher and serves as an advisor at the Office of the Ombudsperson (Autonomous City of Buenos Aires).

Budget debates are, in concrete terms, debates about priorities: what gets funded and what is left behind. In environmental matters, the National Budget clearly shows the role that environmental protection occupies in the public agenda. Comparing the execution of the 2025 Budget with the recently approved 2026 Budget allows us to identify cuts, continuities, and changes in the role of the environmental state in present-day Argentina. This article analyzes how environmental resources were spent in 2025 and what signals the 2026 Budget sends regarding environmental policy, institutional capacities, and compliance with legal obligations.

2025 Budget: allocations and actual execution?

The 2025 Budget for the Secretariat of Environment already represented a real-term decrease compared to previous years, as it repeated the same amounts approved in 2023. Although there were budget modifications during the year, these did not offset inflation or reverse the overall adjustment trend. By the end of the fiscal year, execution showed significant under-expenditure: a large portion of available funds was not converted into actual spending. This was not uniform and particularly affected key programs:

• The Native Forest Fund executed only 20.4% of its allocation, far below the requirements established by Law 26,331. Climate change programs showed low execution levels, including no spending for the implementation of Law 27,520. Environmental education and citizen participation programs had almost no execution.

Under-execution results from administrative delays, institutional reorganizations, and, in some cases, policy decisions. Its effects are concrete: reduced state capacity to prevent environmental damage, non-compliance with existing laws, greater territorial inequalities, and weakening of technical teams.

2026 Budget: what changes and what deepens?

The 2026 Budget maintains a real-term reduction in environmental spending. While nominal increases exist compared to 2025, they do not offset inflation or the accumulated loss of capacity, and environmental expenditure continues to represent a small portion of the total state budget.

• As in previous years, the Native Forest Fund remains below the legally established minimum. Several programs are grouped under a single administrative structure, requiring a limited budget to cover an increasing number of functions. Examples illustrate this situation: the Promotion of Environmental Education program has approximately ARS 50 million annually; the Wetlands Inventory receives just over ARS 1 million; and implementation of Law 27,520 has about ARS 6 million assigned.

This budget framework creates a gap between the declared objectives of environmental policies and the resources available to implement them. Reduced resources do not eliminate existing environmental challenges but limit the capacity to address them in a timely manner. The impact of the environmental budget is also uneven across regions. Provinces and municipalities depend heavily on national transfers to carry out basic environmental policies, so budget constraints can deepen regional disparities and affect the implementation of environmental federalism established by current law. In a context where Argentina has a broad legal and international framework on environmental matters, the availability and effective execution of the budget are central to fulfilling these obligations and commitments.

Analysis of the executed 2025 Budget and the approved 2026 Budget for the Secretariat of Environment shows a clear trend: real-term resource reduction, persistent under-execution, and weakening of national environmental policy. This is not merely a technical adjustment; it has concrete implications for rights, territories, and common goods. Reversing this trend requires not only increasing allocated amounts but also ensuring effective execution, strengthening state capacities, and recognizing that environmental policy is not a dispensable expense but an essential investment for the present and future #ForABetterWorld References:

• Constitution of the Argentine Nation, Article 41

• Law No. 25,675 – General Environmental Law

• Law No. 26,331 – Minimum Budgets for the Protection of Native Forests

• Law No. 27,520 – Minimum Budgets for Climate Change Adaptation and Mitigation

• National General Budget 2025

• National General Budget 2026

• Presupuesto Abierto 2025

• Budget Execution Reports – National Public Administration, Ministry of Economy

• Investment Account 2025 (budget execution by purpose and function)

• Escazú Agreement on Access to Information, Public Participation, and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters

• Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) of the Argentine Republic to the UNFCCC

• FARN (2025). The Environment in the 2026 Budget: adjustments, setbacks, and impact on Rights