Residents of the Combayo community, located in the Cajamarca department of northern Peru, announced a protest for February 6, 2019, against Minera Yanacocha, owned by Colorado’s Newmont Mining Corporation (NYSE: NEM), Peru’s Buenaventura, and the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation.
According to local media, people are blaming the miner for polluting the Mashcón river and its tributaries, thus causing severe water shortages in the area.
They also said that the company, which has been operating there for 25 years, has created more poverty and economic disparities.
Since 2005, the town of Combayo has been opposing Yanacocha’s Carachugo II expansion project and the construction of El Azufre dam, and this new protest is seen as a continuity of their longstanding opposition.
This, despite the fact that in November 2005 authorities, officers from the Ministry of Energy, Combayo residents, and Yanacocha signed an agreement to work jointly to monitor air and water quality in the area and to guarantee a steady water supply. Yanacocha has said it fulfilled its commitment by building three water reservoirs that have benefitted 75 families.
4 Comments
Andrés Sorribes Fernandez
Who knows…
??
Lionel
I guess it is ALL over for Roque Benavides…The decline started quite a while ago.
Rosiel
February is going to be a hot month for protests all over Perú (most likely because of the PDAC in march), so we can imply there are some third-party interest all over these conflicts. It goes far away from just “environmental problems” and reaches politics and everything else.
Fernando Medina
Saying that “there are third-party interests in the conflict” is like saying it’s going to rain in London. Third-party interests are always there in any conflict, as bacteria are present in any non-sterilized blesure. The question is how to deal with those “third-party interests” to prevent them to grow and gain support. And, after 25 years of presence in Cajamarca, it is quite clear that Yanacocha has done everything to feed them.