The canal authority doesn't control the watershed land so it would have been up to the Panamanian government to enact the relevant legislation in the 90s or prior.
That doesn't sound easy at all, even getting better resourced governments to care about things that will directly affect their voters in 30 years in big ways is already very difficult.
Let alone when it's multiple steps removed and the costs are so diffusely spread out across billions of consumers.
> The Panama Canal Authority (Spanish: Autoridad del Canal de Panamá (ACP)) is the agency of the government of Panama responsible for the operation and management of the Panama Canal. The ACP took over the administration of the canal from the Panama Canal Commission, the joint US–Panama agency that managed the canal, on December 31, 1999, when the canal was handed over from the United States to Panama as per the Torrijos–Carter Treaties.
> The Panama Canal Authority is established under Title XIV of the National Constitution, and has exclusive responsibility for the operation, administration, management, preservation, maintenance, and modernization of the canal. It is responsible for the operation of the canal in a safe, continuous, efficient, and profitable manner.[1]
If you disagree, please explain. My understanding was that Panama profits in direkt and indirect ways from the canal, and did so even at a time when the channel wasn't owned by them.
If that is wrong, naive or stupid I'd like to know.
That doesn't sound easy at all, even getting better resourced governments to care about things that will directly affect their voters in 30 years in big ways is already very difficult.
Let alone when it's multiple steps removed and the costs are so diffusely spread out across billions of consumers.