A method to rebuild vegetation formations to determinate environmental damage

The cutting of vegetation has been considered one of the greatest impacts that the human being has made on the ecosystem.1 The change of the land use (harvesting, deforestation, and conversion of grasslands and wetlands), has been reduced the stock of global terrestrial plant in 45% in the last 200 years, with a third of these being achieved in the twentieth century.2 The flora and vegetation are a fundamental pillar for the concept of ecosystem service, they purify the air and water, generate oxygen, stabilizes the soil and serves as habitat for the animals.3 Considering the importance of this ecosystem several countries consider the cutting of vegetation and plants as illegal.4–7 An example is what happens in Chile, where the cut of native vegetation might be considered as an environmental damage. In Chile the environmental damage is regulated by the law No. 19,300 (General Bases of Environment), where it is designated that all the negligent or that willfully cause damage to the environment, will be obliged to repair it materially, at their cost, if this possible, and compensate it in accordance with the law.8,9 Environmental damage involves the obvious transgression to the constitutional right to live in an environment without pollution.8 In this way, the 19,300 law defines environmental damage for all legal purposes as “any loss, decrease, detriment or significant impairment inferred to the environment or to one or more of its components (article 2 letter e)”. Within the environmental damage there is the destruction of native vegetation.