‘Making
Argentina great again’? What a year under a climate-change denying president
has done for the country
Javier
Milei’s push for extraction and cuts to land protections have left people
fearing for their way of life – and environmentalists concerned about the
future
Sam Meadows
in Buenos Aires
Wed 11 Dec
2024 11.30 GMT
Like many
who follow Mapuche traditions in the Mendoza region of Argentina, Gabriel
Jofré, 50, raises goats, moving between the plains in winter and the peaks of
the Andes in summer, amid the region’s 4,000 glaciers. But the future of his
people’s ancestral way of life is threatened, he says, by the climate crisis
and plans for mining projects in the area.
In October,
the local governor, Alfredo Cornejo, led the National Institute of Indigenous
Affairs to reconsider the recognition of ancestral lands belonging to three
Mapuche communities, potentially paving the way for the auction of public
lands, 34 new copper exploration projects and the creation of the Malargüe
western mining district.
The move
comes on top of the national government’s decision to authorise the sale of
federal lands, including in the Andes region.
“Climate
change is already affecting us. If this type of activity advances, the impact
will deepen,” says Jofré, adding that glacial decline and droughts have made it
more challenging to work from traditional knowledge. “Our territories are an
inseparable part of our identity and culture. They are our source of food and
traditional medicine.”
Cornejo is
an ally of the Argentine president, Javier Milei, who has previously dismissed
the climate crisis as a “socialist lie” and believes that the environment
should be at the service of the economy in a country where more than half the
population lives in poverty.
The push
towards mining is just one of the impacts of Milei’s first year in office. In
November, Argentina withdrew its negotiators from the Cop29 climate summit in
Baku, Azerbaijan. For now, the country remains in the Paris agreement, the
international treaty that aims to limit global warming to 1.5C compared with
pre-industrial levels.
Since taking
office, Milei has radically shrunk the size of the state, including downgrading
the environment ministry to an under-secretariat, while budgets for
environmental protection have been reduced.
His
“omnibus” reform law, a behemoth consisting of 664 articles aimed at completely
redrawing the legislature, included provisions to tear up the laws protecting
glaciers and forests. The law was debated for months, during which both
provisions were removed, but campaigners fear environmental protections will
not stay off the chopping block for long.
The package,
however, features the Incentive Regime for Large Investments (Rigi), a policy
designed to exploit the country’s extensive natural resources. Argentina has
the world’s second-largest source of shale gas, in a Patagonia field known as
Vaca Muerta (meaning dead cow), and a fifth of the planet’s lithium. Oil
exploration is also taking place off its coast.
Marcelo
García, an analyst at consultancy firm Horizon Engage says Rigi is an attempt
to speed up investment in natural resources, in line with Milei’s vision of
economic development. “Of course, in terms of the environment, that has an
indirect impact,” he adds.
Environmentalists
fear the policy may significantly impact conservation by offering tax
incentives to major investors in critical sectors such as mining, oil and gas,
while environmental laws are weakened.
The glaciers
could be affected by mining activities, by the opening of access roads, by
consumption of water for exploration
Eduardo Sosa
Manuel
Jaramillo, general director at the Argentine Wildlife Foundation, says the
attempt to abolish environmental laws “showed the direction of [Milei’s]
political project”.
Pia
Marchegiani, deputy executive director of the Environment and Natural Resources
Foundation, says Milei has already stated that his government will send new
proposals to change environmental regulations to Congress. “His idea is that
the state should be as small as possible with an extreme free-market approach,”
she says.
Rigi makes
Argentina the “most open for investment” country in South America’s lithium
triangle, but at the cost of lax regulations, Marchegiani adds.
“The
national agency is very weak and power lies with the provinces, which are
smaller and highly dependent on royalties from the mining sector,” she says.
“Milei’s environmental policy ignores the scientific evidence of the triple
environmental crisis. It also squanders the opportunity to transform the
production and consumption model, an effort that much of the world is
undertaking.”
The
consequences of Milei’s policies are already visible throughout the country.
Argentina has a federal system with much power resting with its provinces.
Milei required state governors to pledge allegiance to his goals by signing the
May pact, which commits provinces to the “exploitation of the country’s natural
resources”.
Eduardo
Sosa, a former chief of staff at Mendoza’s environment ministry, says the
situation has “worsened considerably” since Milei’s election, and the
cumulative impact of exploration could be “very significant”.
“The
glaciers could be affected by the mining activities, by the opening of new
access roads, by the consumption of water for exploration work, and by the
suspended dust that could be deposited on the ice and accelerate its melting,”
Sosa says.
The Mendoza
government did not respond to a request for comment.
At the
council meeting that approved exploration, Hebe Casado, vice-governor of
Mendoza, said it would create “new opportunities for many people, especially in
areas that have long sought economic growth”. She also argued that the
provincial government acted with “transparency” and “responsibility” and that
companies must submit new environmental impact assessments to ensure high
environmental standards.
For most
Argentines, environmental protection is unlikely to rank among their
priorities. When Milei took charge, the country was experiencing one of the
worst financial crises in the world, with inflation hitting nearly 300%.
Inflation has fallen, but poverty and unemployment have increased. In November,
an Ipsos poll found just 4% of Argentines put the climate crisis as their main
worry, while 49% cited unemployment and 45% poverty and inequality as their
chief concerns.
“There is no
real public debate on this issue,” García says. “As a result of the many
decades of economic upheavals in the country, the environment is as little an
issue as I have seen in my lifetime.”
Sosa says
that Milei’s “libertarian wave” has changed the terms of debate, including free
discussion of “eliminating all traces of environmentalism”. “In previous years,
this would have faced social condemnation and even political backlash,” he
says.
Another
wildcard is the election of Donald Trump in the US, with whom Milei has enjoyed
a good relationship. The US president-elect utilised his own catchphrase when
telling Milei to “make Argentina great again”.
However,
Milei is likely to be limited by his pragmatism and economic reality, García
says. While Rigi has certainly piqued international investors’ interest, most
are waiting to see whether currency restrictions will be lifted before piling
in. “I think 2025 will be an important year,” he says.
García also
points out that while Milei has cultivated a “firebrand” persona, he has acted
pragmatically when push comes to shove – and that could affect his decisions
about the environment. “If you walk out of the Paris agreement, then some
private companies will have trouble investing in Argentina,” he says.
“He has
limited his actions in a very pragmatic way when it could be harmful to his
ultimate agenda of surviving as president.”
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