Why have indigenous people turned to gold mining in the Ecuadorian Amazon when they previously opposed it?
There is an unprecedented gold rush in indigenous areas of southeastern Ecuador. With indigenous people historically resisting mining activities, researcher Gard Frækaland Vangsnes delved into the history and current status of mining in the region to find out why people are turning to the controversial livelihood.
The Shuar are an indigenous population that inhabit the southern Ecuadorian Amazon. They are the largest indigenous community in the region, renowned for their hunting skills and former traditions of head-hunting and head shrinking. Whilst their head-hunting days are long gone, small-scale gold mining is expanding in the area. Gold mining has been present in Ecuador since Incan times but was widely opposed by indigenous people - until recently.
Massive global increase
The Shuar aren’t the only ones joining the gold rush. A massive, global expansion of small-scale gold mining has been observed in the last decade. Recent research estimates a 625% increase in artisanal and small-scale gold-mining (ASGM) in the last 10 years – and that is just within indigenous territories in the Brazilian Amazon.
“After years of deliberations among Shuar constituencies on the question of whether or not to open for mining, a democratic majority agreed to allow mining in their territories,” explains Vangsnes.
That was in 2017, at a time that coincided with a marked drop in the price of key cash crops. With alternative livelihoods failing and a green light to turn to small-scale gold-mining, that is exactly what many Shuar people did.
The vote in favour of mining was compounded by the construction of a new road that connected this remote region to the national grid, facilitating the transport of heavy machinery. The stage was set for more extraction activities.
"To prevail, one must use the means of the opponent"
Vangsnes traced the turn to gold mining to the Shuar peoples’ response to earlier colonial violations such as forced conversion to Christianity and the use of the Latin alphabet in mission boarding schools. A consistent Shuar response has been based on the principle of using the same methods as the opponent in order to survive. Throughout history, they have adapted to external pressures by learning and adopting the practices of others – and this includes mining.
“The Shuar people’s adherence to the principle ‘to prevail, one must use the means of the opponent’ is solidly documented throughout history,” says Vangsnes. “My research found that a similar dynamic is being played out in relation to small-scale mining. The Shuar can learn how to do it, control it, and capitalize on it to strengthen themselves materially – and also politically."
The Shuar peoples’ adoption of small-scale gold mining may seem counterintuitive when indigenous peoples are often viewed as defenders of the land. The mining does not, however, compromise the Shuars’ protection of their territory, argues Vangsnes.
“The Shuar still have large tracts of unmined land and are engaged in conservation schemes alongside the subsistence farming, and more recently, gold mining,” he explains.
Provide alternatives to mining
Aside from the oceans, the Amazon is the world’s largest carbon sink – that is, a place that absorbs more carbon than it releases. Feasible livelihood alternatives need to be available to local communities if mining is to stop. If international donors and businesses really want to save this rainforest, and not only check their Corporate Social Responsibility boxes, then they need to step it up, says Vangsnes.
Vangsnes’ research contributes to the regional ethnography and anthropology on the indigenous peoples that live in the Amazon. The new data helps us to better understand the connection between extractivism and indigenous people, and challenges dominant assumptions.
Vangsnes concludes: “We all depend on the Amazon. I want to say to international donors and anyone involved in conservation in the Amazon that gold mining is booming and likely to expand at an unprecedented pace. If you have any ambition to slow this down, there needs to be real alternatives to the gold economy - and that will require a substantial increase of capital flow to local communities. In the eyes of indigenous leaders, all that currently trickles down to the local communities is just the leftovers from the pot of funds - most of which are used to cover the salaries of high-end bureaucrats in the conservation and development industries.”
Gard Frækaland Vangsnes will defend his doctoral thesis: We are all miners (Todos somos mineros): An ethnography of gold mining in the Ecuadorian Amazon on Friday 13 September at the Norwegian University of Life Sciences.
