Indigenous Kawésqar take on salmon farms in Chile’s southernmost fjords
The town of Puerto Natales, in the Magallanes and Antártica Chilena region of southern Chile, was once devoted to fishing and tourism. But in recent years it has become the operational base for the salmon industry expanding through the fjords of Kawésqar National Reserve.
The Kawésqar are the last descendants of a population of nomadic hunter-gatherers and fishermen who have inhabited this territory for around 6,000 years. They were decimated by colonization and genocide until the first decades of the 20th century. Today some family groups live in the town bordering the reserve.
In recent years, Kawésqar communities have learned new forms of resistance to counter the proliferation of the salmon industry, which is harming the fragile ecosystem of their ancestral territory. According to Chile’s Undersecretary of Fisheries and Aquaculture, in October 2022 there were 1,360 salmon farms in the wider area of Chilean Patagonia, of which 133 were in Magallanes and Antártica Chilena. Sixty-seven of these were within Kawésqar National Reserve, and another 66 concessions were in process there.
Earthmob
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