Vulnerability and resistance to neoliberal environmental changes: An assessment of agriculture and forestry in the Biobio region of Chile (1974–2014)

Forestry development, water scarcity, and the Mapuche protest for environmental justice in Chile

“…The new forestry regulatory regime took shape in the context of the privatization of forestry companies that had been created previously in the framework of state-driven forestry development that would be taken from the public sector and transformed into private corporations. Under the new policy, since 1974 the neoliberal Chilean state has provided economic subsidies and tax exemptions for establishing forestry plantations, encouraging the rapid and substantial growth of forestry and related industries in southern Chile (KLUBOCK, 2014;BENGOA, 2012;TORRES et al, 2015). In this new neoliberal stage, the expansion of forestry plantations is still based on the argument made by Federico Albert at the beginning of the 20 th century: to establish forestry to protect the soil and control erosion.…”

“…While forestry has contributed to economic development -becoming the second most important extractive activity in the country after mining-recent studies have shown that the geographic expansion of forestry monocultures has contributed significantly to socio-environmental problems that fall outside the type of sustainable forestry management that proponents of the industry claim it develops. Particularly, soil erosion and water scarcity in densely forested areas inhabited by rural Mapuche and non-Mapuche peasant communities (BENGOA, 1999: 227;MONTALBA et al, 2005;HUBER et al, 2010;STHER et al, 2010;AYLWIN et al, 2012;KLUBOCK, 2014;PERI-ÓDICO RESUMEN, 2014;VOCES EN LUCHA, 2015;TORRES et al, 2015).…”

“…In this work we analyze these processes of change and socio-environmental conflicts as a historical continuum, linking the environmental degradation of forestry development to historic patterns of social and environmental injustices with Mapuche communities in Chile. In the context of neoliberal globalization, these conflicts are structured by the jointly actions of the state and large private forestry corporations (KLUBOCK, 2014;TORRES et al, 2015). In light of the global neoliberal agreements, these global players expand forestry production while attempting to control externalities within normative frameworks that do not succeed in preventing socio-environmental impacts or limiting their scope.…”

Disciplinamiento de las subjetividades como estrategia de prevención de incendios: El caso de las plantaciones forestales en el sur de Chile

“…El ochenta por ciento de los pagos de las subvenciones fue a tres empresas forestales de las más grandes de Chile, que desplazaron los mercados de capitales privados. Por otra parte, muchas de las tierras que fueron redistribuidas entre los grupos campesinos de la reforma agraria (1962)(1963)(1964)(1965)(1966)(1967)(1968)(1969)(1970)(1971)(1972)(1973) fueron devueltas a sus propietarios anteriores (Torres et al, 2015). Veinte años más tarde, una modificación del Decreto 701 (Ley 19.561, 1998) motivó también a sujetos propietarios individuales a participar como proveedores de materia prima a la industria: campesinado chileno y mapuche dejó de considerarse obstáculo para la expansión forestal y comenzó a recibir subsidios para la plantación de árboles.…”

Economic effects of climate change on agriculture: multi-scale assessment through regional mathematical programming models

“…Here, as in other sectors in Chile (see Berger et al 2006), it can be observed the contrast between competitive export-oriented and local agriculture as represented by small-scale farmers and indigenous peoples oriented towards an internal market (OECD, 2008;Torres et al, 2015). Small-scale farmers predominate in the regions in which the basin is located (Apey and Barril, 2006), which are also the regions with the largest use of policies aimed at promoting local economic development and small-scale farmers (Donoso et al, 2010).…”