For Chilean Herders, Melting Glaciers Imperil Cultural Traditions

[Judi Lynn]

Jesus Carrasco rests on a ridgeline before descending into the valley below to retrieve his goats.


07.17.2023
WORDS AND PHOTOGRAPHS BY LAURA ISAZA AND SACHI KITAJIMA MULKEY

As glaciers melt in the heart of the Chilean Andes, traditional herding communities are caught between a conservation movement and a national mining industry.

Jesus Carrasco’s goats are acting up again. On a precarious mountain ridge on the banks of a once-raging river, more than a hundred goats graze among the few remaining patches of leafy green vegetation.

“We’re going riding,” he said, saddling up his horse and brushing off the dust blending in with the brown suede of his brimmed hat. Here, in the foothills of the Andes, just 40 miles from Chile’s capital city of Santiago, the color brown stretches for miles.

Whooping for his herd to return, Jesus steers his horse down into the valley and across the river towards the goats. They scatter, like misbehaving school children, then regroup in bursts, urged on by the scolding yips of Jesus’s five farm dogs. The terrain is impossibly steep, but Jesus is unafraid—his horse has done this before. The goats clump into a bleating cloud, slowly rolling across the landscape, back toward the Carrasco family farmstead.

Jesus is an arriero: a cultural group of Chileans who practice free-range ranching and horseback trekking in the Andes. Rounding up his herd can take Jesus up to an hour, even when it doesn’t stray. But Jesus doesn’t mind. “I like the freedom,” he said. “The freedom of living in the mountains and being with the animals.” In the distance, the setting sun silhouettes a single icy peak—a reminder of when the barren mountains were once blanketed in snow, even in summer.

Such landscape transformation is a familiar story for many Chileans. In the last 14 years, a historic megadrought has swept through Chile, threatening national food security and drying rivers until they fight to reach the sea. The watershed where Jesus Carrasco lives, known as the Cajón del Maipo, provides 70% of all drinkable water in Santiago, home to 40% of Chile’s population. The glaciers that feed the watershed, like most across the world, are withering from a warming climate. But the ones here face a second threat: mining.

In Chile, mining is an economic powerhouse. The industry, which employs over 250,000 Chileans, provides almost 30% of the world’s copper supply and over 50% of the world’s lithium reserves. These are essential metals in the clean energy transition—as countries respond to climate threats with decarbonization efforts, the global appetite for Chilean metals is only increasing.

More:
https://atmos.earth/for-chilean-herders-melting-glaciers-imperil-cultural-traditions/