Andean Water Wars: The Silala Case
Publisher: Council on Hemispheric Affairs
Author(s): Ronald Bruce St. John
Date: 2019
Topics: Dispute Resolution/Mediation, Renewable Resources
Countries: Bolivia, Chile
The Atacama Desert is the second driest place on earth, and the watersheds of the rivers in the region, the Lauca, Maurí, and Silala, have long been in dispute. In a time when climate change impacts hydrographic basins everywhere, the dispute over the remote Silala watershed, in particular, has become a testament to the importance of fresh water. In 2007, “the underlying issues of politics, economics, sovereignty, and history” led the U.N. Environmental Programme to conclude the Silala was “one of the most hydropolitically vulnerable basins in the world.”