Women and Indigenous Peoples in Bolivia Resist Dispossession of Resource-Rich Lands

Jun 8, 2024 | Franz Chávez
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There is a natural relationship between women and their attachment to the land, the natural environment, clean water, and uncontaminated food, agreed the women interviewed by IPS who are leading the defense of their indigenous communities’ ancestral territories.

A review of last year’s data, compiled by IPS based on various journalistic sources, shows that in at least eight of Bolivia’s nine departments, there is a presence of companies and mining cooperatives in conflict with indigenous communities and peoples, who denounce the contamination of water sources and rivers, and the damage to farmland and pastureland.

Bolivia is a country with a geographical area of one million 99,000 square kilometers, located in the center of South America.

The geography of this highland and Amazonian country includes the Andean region, which covers 28% of the country, the intermediate zone of valleys and yungas, which covers 13%, and the plains that make up the Bolivian Amazon, which cover 59% of the country.

Among the natural resources, which are abundant in a large part of the country, soya monoculture stands out, along with gold, silver, tin, lithium, and natural gas, which is in a phase of decline.