Only a sliver of criminal complaints reach sentencing as staffing shortages, budget limits, and distrust choke investigations nationwide Ecuador’s criminal justice system is straining under pressures that have quietly accumulated for years but are now impossible to ignore. Prosecutors across the country are handling volumes of cases that far exceed their institutional capacity, while convictions […]

From Michael: I wrote this tongue-in-cheek column in early 2020, back when The Cuenca Dispatch was print-only and safely immune from reader comments. I’m reprinting it now because… well, what could possibly go wrong? Today only, we are offering our one-of-a-kind, never publicly offered before, fully proven and sure to work guide, “How to Destroy […]

Coverage limits protect savers per institution, not per person, reshaping how risk is understood. A system built on where money is held Deposit insurance in Ecuador is often misunderstood as a single ceiling applied to a person’s total savings. In reality, the system is structured around institutions, not individuals. Coverage applies separately to each financial […]

Intense downpours push waterways toward flood alerts while securing hydroelectric reserves after years of drought. Cuenca has entered 2026 under a markedly different hydrological reality than the previous two years. Instead of prolonged dryness, the city and the wider Austro region are facing sustained rainfall marked not only by regular frequency but by unusually strong […]

Suspension halts extraction, but communities describe poisoned water, fear, and a crisis that long predates the decree. A sweeping halt after years of warnings The national government’s decision to suspend all mining activity in the Napo River basin has drawn a sharp line under years of environmental deterioration and social tension in one of Ecuador’s […]