Fever of the quinoa fuel violence in Bolivia

Quinoa crops are causing strong disputes within Bolivia.

Considered by NASA as one of the food "most complete" to humans due to its high nutritional content, quinoa has become a grain of fashion and now constitutes the center of a violent dispute of lands within the Bolivia.

The cultivation of the grain, championed by proponents of healthy food throughout the world, has rekindled a border problem between the main producing country areas. According to some sources, the plantations also threaten to cause desertification in a region that is inhospitable to agriculture.

The confrontation between the producers of the towns of Quillacas and Coroma, in the Western Bolivian quinoa, left eight wounded last month, according to the Governor of the Department of Potosí, Félix González, who has been calling on the central Government of the militarization of the area.

According to local media, in March three peasants from Potosí were taken hostage in the framework of conflict in the same region. The representation of the United Nations in Bolivia was offered to mediate.

According to the newspaper La Razón, dozens of Bolivians were injured by stones impacts and an explosion of dynamite and a hundred police were deployed to control the situation.

The clashes occurred within an area that will compete for the departments of Oruro and Potosí, two major producing regions Bolivia quinoa, and probably the world.

Widely consumed by the incas, quinoa is now used in salads or rice.

NASA believes that quinoa is an ideal food for space stations.

NASA has listed her as ideal food for those who inhabit the space stations, mainly due to its high protein content.

In the last decade, Bolivian exports of cereals have increased more than 20 times, to spend $2.5 billion to us $65 million. The price of the product has tripled since 2006.

According to Mario Martinez, spokesman for the Government of Potosí, although the farmers in the region have reached a truce recently, dividing by half of the production area, tensions persist.

"It is a fragile agreement and, as we are in the time of harvest, could lead to a new war at any moment," said Martinez, who accuses peasants of Oruro "to take by force" 25% of the harvest in the region in dispute. The orureños deny.

Bolivia is the main exporter of quinoa, which is produced on a smaller scale in other Andean countries, and which has recently started to grow also in the United States, Canada and Brazil.

"The rapid expansion of agriculture in Bolivia helps feed conflicts," said Colonel David, the National Institute of agricultural innovation and forest (INIAF). "Before I had to travel four or five hours of Oruro to find areas of cultivation." "Quinoa is now less than ten minutes away from the city," says.

One of the phenomena caused by the "fever of quinoa" is the return of the peasants who had left the rural areas of the impoverished Bolivian altiplano towards cities or other parts of the country.

Some of these emigrants returned to settle in their former communities. Others prefer to stay in the field only during the planting and harvesting seasons.

"There are even cases of Bolivians living abroad, in countries such as Brazil and Argentina, which are turning to quinoa growing," says Ernesto Juan Crispin, the National Association of producers of quinoa (ANAPQUI), which brings together more than 1,200 producers.

The boundary between Oruro and Potosí dispute is centuries old. The two regions are calling for an area of approximately 250 km² suitable for the cultivation of quinoa, but also rich in uranium and rock used in the manufacture of cement.

In addition to the border conflict, fever of quinoa is also leaving a massive desertification in certain areas as effect.

Producers earn $1.60 per kilo of quinoa, but it sells for us $ per half kilo.

Agronomist engineer Vladimir Orsag, agricultural expert from the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés, explains that quinoa are sown in a fragile soil, 80% composed of sand. The climate is dry and temperatures can reach - 30 degrees.

"With the rise of prices in the international market, there are producers who are abandoning the traditional techniques and reducing rest periods of the Earth for agriculture in mass," he said.

According to Orsag, migration of producers could lead to new conflicts like those of Coroma and Quillacas. "The arrival of people from other cities and regions to quinoa-producing areas creates an underlying tension that will only increase if there is a depletion of the soil," says Orsag.

All this despite the fact that much of the profits are for the sale and export of grain, not in the production itself, according to Sandro Lopez, of the departmental Chamber of quinoa Real Potosí (Cadequir).

Bolivian farmers earn about $1.60 per kilo of quinoa. In the markets of Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, the price reaches us $30 per half kilo of product.

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