- Since June 2, protesters have blocked mining company Grupo México from extracting water in the Sonoran town of Bacoachi, in northwest Mexico.
- Locals say the company has overexploited water resources during a regional drought, putting their livelihoods and public health at risk.
- The company owns the rights to more than half of the watershed’s total volume, according to a government analysis published in 2023.
- The ongoing protest comes as local advocacy groups are preparing to mark the 10th anniversary of an infamous waste spill from the same mine in August 2014.
Protesters in the northwest Mexican state of Sonora are blocking the country’s largest mining company, Grupo México, from withdrawing water, in an ongoing standoff against the company and state police.
Since June 2, residents of Bacoachi, a rural town 50 kilometers (30 miles) south of the U.S. border, have protested in shifts along Evans Canyon Road between the town’s thoroughfare and the Bacoachi River, a tributary of Sonora River. The blockade, which locals insist has remained nonviolent, was broken up once in July before being reinstated the following day. Only water trucks with Grupo México logos are being stopped, protesters say, while other vehicles pass through.
Grupo México owns several concessions to extract water in the region to operate a copper mine an hour’s drive north of Bacoachi. But locals accuse the company of overexploiting the watershed during a period of drought, jeopardizing livelihoods in a region that depends on farms and ranches. For several years, the company has faced allegations of wider human rights violations in the region following an infamous waste spill in 2014.
“The people never got involved with Grupo México; Grupo México got involved with us by trying to take our water,” said Fernando Ramírez, a former agricultural engineer with the government’s agriculture and rural development department, who now works as a consultant and owns a small garlic farm in Bacoachi.
Locals in Bacoachi can experience running water outages for weeks at a time, according to Ramírez. “If we had not blocked the extraction of water from Grupo México, Bacoachi would be suffering the consequences right now,” he told Mongabay, adding that locals typically turn their pumps off each afternoon in the hope that their running water will replenish by the following morning.
A spokesperson for Grupo México told Mongabay that the company suspended water trucks to Bacoachi shortly after the blockade began in June. In an image taken during a standoff between protesters and state police on July 9, however, what appear to be company trucks can be seen queuing on the road. Protesters say they prevented those trucks from passing before the blockade was cleared by police that evening, without arrests. The blockade was reinstated the following morning.
Neither the office of Sonora’s attorney general nor state security police responded to Mongabay’s request for comment. Grupo México’s spokesperson did not confirm whether the blockade was affecting the mine’s operations.
Bacoachi is not unique in experiencing water shortages. More than half of Mexico is currently under moderate to severe drought, according to the national water authority. In May, police officers protested water shortages in Mexico City’s barracks; a month later, two demonstrators were killed at a water protest in the southern state of Veracruz. Emergency drinking water is currently being distributed in seven states, including Sonora.
Locals say that given the drought conditions, Grupo México should not be allowed to extract water that could otherwise recharge local wells. Copper mines commonly use vast volumes of freshwater for processing. After milling ore into small pieces, the mixture is floated to separate particles of metal from waste. Depending on the quality of the ore, it can take as much as 3,500 liters (925 gallons, about the size of 12 bathtubs) of water to process a metric ton of copper, according to a literature review by the U.S. Geological Survey.
Grupo México’s Buenavista del Cobre mine is entitled to extract 53 billion liters (14 billion gallons, or 175 million bathtubs) of water in the region, according to Mexico’s public water registry. That is equivalent to 57% of the watershed’s total volume, the Mexican environmental department concluded in a report published in May 2023. “This represents water hoarding,” the report concluded, “preventing other users from having water available for priority activities such as human use and food production.”
The 2023 report acknowledges that drought could be a contributing factor to a “sustained decline” in the watershed’s volume. It notes, however, that the aquifer’s consistent decline began in November 2010, when Buenavista del Cobre reopened after a three-year strike over health and safety concerns, then tripled its copper yield compared with its previous production, without immediately purchasing larger water concessions. Before 2010, the report notes, the aquifer seemed able to quickly recover after periods of drought.
Ramírez said the blockade is meaningful but admitted it could not continue forever. “The truth is that people are getting desperate,” he said. “We are aware people want to get on with their lives, but we are also aware that if we don’t continue, then Bacoachi will die — because it will not have water, people will not be able to work. It will be a ghost town.”
While the blockade continues, Ramírez and other locals are preparing to request a federal injunction against Grupo México, whose behavior they allege violates a 2012 amendment to Mexico’s constitution enshrining citizens’ rights to water. According to Mexico’s national water law, passed in 1992, there is no limit to the volume of concessions any company can buy.
In a written statement posted to X, formerly Twitter, Grupo México said it “has documented the legality, sustainability and transparency of its use of deep wells in the area, in compliance with current regulations.” The statement, which was subsequently deleted from X, goes on to attribute water shortages “mainly due to the lack of rainfall” and insists “there is no relation between this problem and mining activity.”
The blockade comes just before the 10th anniversary of an infamous waste spill from Buenavista del Cobre into the Sonora and Bacanuchi rivers. Locals in towns along the Sonora River continue to blame Grupo México for increased incidence of cancer cases and for abandoning remediation efforts. “It is the height of cynicism for Grupo México to speak of legality,” the Sonora River Basin Committee said in response to the company’s statement about the blockade. The committee was established after the spill in August 2014 to advocate for further remediation and health support and was not involved in the organization of the blockade.
After years of exploitation, Ramírez said the blockade is a source of pride for as long as it lasts. “I am optimistic because I know that this has to change,” he said. “There are many people who have suffered because of Grupo México, and there should be a remedy so they don’t have the arrogance to do what they always do: to try to crush you, to try to dominate the population and get away with it.”
Banner image: The Sonora river valley has dried out as a result of the ongoing drought. Image by Daniel Shailer for Mongabay.
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