“Female activist denounced that in Bolivia there is an extinction plan on course for indigenous populations” – 30^th October 2018

A development plan, that includes the execution of Chepete, El Bala and Rositas hydroelectric megaprojects, mining and fossil fuel extractive concessions in many regions of the country, as well as the widening of the agricultural boarder, threaten to provoke the disappearance of indigenous populations, affirms Ruth Alipaz Cuqui, indigenous Uchupiamona from the communities of the rivers Beni, Quiquibey and Tiuchi.  “In Bolivia there is deforestation of huge territories for soy plantations and the granting of mining and fossil fuel concessions in various parts of the country”. She assured that the hydroelectric dams Chepete and El Bala, as well as destroying the biodiversity in the region, will displace over 5,000 people that live in the territories that will be affected.  In addition to these projects, she said, is the Rositas complexity, formed of seven hydroelectric dams that will flood over 40,000 hectares of forest of the basin of the river Grande and affect the provinces Valle Grande and Cordillera in the department of Santa Cruz.  According to Alipaz, the Government´s global plan includes “the road through the heart of Tipnis, that has the aim of consolidating the process of colonisation to expand the coca plantations, the concessions granted to Chinese companies to loot the Illimani Chimán territory that has been sold off in concessions for mining extractive projects, Tariquía is an example of the petrol exploration with fracking, the Madid park is threatened by the plantation of coca and mining”…