BOLIVIA:
Indigenous Lands Turn to Desert
 

José Luis Alcázar*

TARIJA, Bolivia, Aug 16 (Tierramérica) - Forty-five percent of Bolivian territory is undergoing a relentless process of desertification, with agricultural, forestry and infrastructure losses valued at more than 500 million dollars a year -- and it is taking a particular toll on the indigenous communities of the high plains.

The erosion of arid, semi-arid and other climate zones affects seven of the nine departments in this South American country, and extends across some 495,000 square km of Bolivia's territory of 1.98 million square km.

The departments with most erosion are Oruro, Potosí, Chuquisaca and Tarija, in the west and south. Meanwhile, the Bolivian Amazon departments of Beni and Pando, with their rainforests, are still safe from the phenomenon, although they do suffer soil degradation.

Studies conducted by the government, scientists and indigenous activists, consulted by Tierramérica, reveal some of the causes of the desertification: deforestation, salinization and compaction of soils, expansion of the farming frontier, overgrazing, and inappropriate use of irrigation and drainage systems.

”'La Pachamama' (Mother Earth in the Andean indigenous tradition) is completely exhausted and malnourished, and can give no more,” said activist Max Paredes, member of the Aymara Peoples Parliament, underscoring that the worst affected zone comprises the Bolivian, Peruvian and Chilean high plains, or Altiplano.

The climate in that area is arid and semi-arid, with 150 to 300 days of frost a year, high levels of solar radiation, average annual rainfall of 300 millimetres and rapid evaporation, Bolivian scientist Jorge Quintanilla explained in a Tierramérica interview.

”Desertification irreparably affects the indigenous communities, particularly in the Altiplano, where the farmland and pastures are turning into sand dunes, uniting with the Atacama Desert” in northern Chile, university professor and Aymara activist Carlos Mamani told Tierramérica.

In the east, especially in Santa Cruz, ”the phenomenon is linked to the unregulated advance of the agricultural frontier affecting the habitat of the peoples of the jungle,” he added.

The ecosystems and biodiversity become severely damaged in areas of erosion.

”In the TPDS system (Titicaca, Poopó, Desaguadero and Salares, which encompasses Peru and western Bolivia), the high contamination of the scarce water resources by mining and its environmental waste is causing reduced use of those areas for agriculture, migration of indigenous peoples, and environmental degradation,” Quintanilla said.

Furthermore, the indiscriminate use of flora means loss of tola (resinous bushes of the Parastrephia and Baccharis families), used as fuel, and a trend towards the disappearance of the yareta (Azorella compacta), according to Quintanilla.

Also suffering are populations of animal species, such as the vizcacha (Lagidium viscacia) and the chinchilla (Chinchilla brevicaudata), several types of rodents, and the Andean deer.

Native fish species like the ispi and the carachi (of the Orestias family) and the mauri (Trichomycterus dispar) are on the verge of disappearing, and the pejerrey (Odontesthes bonariensis), a fish introduced to the region, shows signs of drastic reduction.

The communities most affected by desertification in the Bolivian Altiplano, says Quintanilla, are Toledo, Orinoca, Pampa Aullagas, Quillacas, Llapallapani, Huancane, Poopó, Pazña, Machacamarca, and other smaller ones around the Poopó and Uru Uru lakes in the northeast of Oruro.

The greatest harm, said the expert, is experienced by ”the group originally from the area, and older than the Aymaras, which are the Uru Muratos, who were essentially fisherfolk and are spread in communities around the Uru Uru and Poopó lakes, in some 100 families,” for a total of about 500 people.

An estimated 4,000 people migrated from the TPDS zone between 1990 and 2003.

In Mamani's opinion, ”the lack of life” in the Altiplano ”is evident in the hills, where only the elderly and young children remain.”

Meanwhile, in the eastern department of Santa Cruz, dominated by the major South American ecosystems of the Amazon and the Chaco, the country's most modern and commercial-driven agriculture is being developed. More than 80 percent of that area has been deforested in the last 30 years.

Deforestation, widespread use of agro-chemicals and machinery, and over-hunting have significantly reduced what was once a great diversity of wildlife. Wild pigs, tejones, foxes, wildcats, armadillos, and various reptile and snake species now are found almost exclusively in the country's national parks.

In Tarija, threatened by a process of total desertification, endemic species are in grave danger, including more than 200 types of mammals, 1,500 birds and around 100 kinds of fish.

Bolivia's political and social instability conspire against implementation of a national programme that includes the provisions of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification, in force since 1996.

Carlos Zamora, director of Watersheds and Water Resources and entrusted with the anti-desertification programme, told Tierramérica that the lack of continuity in the government administration has put the brakes on implementation.

Zamora awaits the approval of the plan for fighting desertification. For now, projects are under way as part of the Subregional Programmes of the Puna (Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Ecuador and Peru) and the Chaco Americano (Argentina, Bolivia and Paraguay), Zamora said.

In the opinion of Aymara activist Mamani, the lack of decisive action is part of ”the ineffectiveness of the state bureaucracy, because it doesn't care about the survival of indigenous peoples, whose territories are being turned into desert.”

(* José Luis Alcázar is a Tierramérica contributor. Originally published Aug. 13 by Latin American newspapers that are part of the Tierramérica network. Tierramérica is a specialised news service produced by IPS with the backing of the United Nations Development Programme and the United Nations Environment Programme.)

(END/2005)