- by Graham Holton
- The Guardian
- Issue #2174
In the aftermath of COP 30 in Belem, Brazil this November it is worth considering the plight of the Guarani community in Bolivia. Climate conferences can seem remote and hard to relate to. The Guarani are facing climate change at a local level.
They are facing significant climate change-caused environmental damage particularly in the Charagua Iyambae of the Gran Chaco, which covers 750,000 square kilometres. Currently only five per cent of this rich biome is environmentally protected. The region is experiencing deforestation, water scarcity, and extreme weather events. The Guarani face deforestation, land appropriation, and industrial byproduct pollution from monoculture agriculture. Decreased agricultural productivity has led to forced migration to urban areas such as Santa Cruz.
What has been missing in media reports is the perspective of Indigenous and rural communities, especially from women, who bear the brunt of the effects of climate change. Women environmental activists and women’s collectives are actively seeking solutions to the impact of climate change on their communities.
Climate change has led to more frequent periods of drought, and this has been aggravated by unregulated slash and burn techniques, a leading cause of wildfires. Bolivian authorities have ignored illegal settlements in protected areas. These changes threaten medicinal plants important for the Indigenous communities’ way of life.
The construction of the Itaipu Dam, which trapped Guarani communities in a degraded area, has led to erosion and contamination from nearby farms. The Guarani Aquifer System, the world’s third-largest transboundary aquifer, is overexploited by unregulated drilling and infrastructure development. Environmental degradation has forced many Guarani to migrate to cities in search of work, leading to social and economic hardships.
In 2020 the Guarani Aquifer Treaty set up a Commission for its joint management. Five years later, its function remains a mystery. Crucial documentation has been requested by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, on the Commission’s involvement in the environmental assessment of green hydrogen projects, such as the Tambor Green Hydrogen Hub in Uruguay. It has requested documents on the Strategic Action Program of the Guarani Aquifer, and details on the relationship between the Commission and the Administrative Commission of the Uruguay River (CARU).
The Guarani people are fighting environmental damage through legal battles, advocacy, and implementing sustainable practices. Communities work with international bodies and NGOs to get support for their struggles. They have taken on corporations and governments, leading to recent victories in Bolivia and Paraguay regarding land rights and pesticide use. The Ava Guarani in Paraguay won a case at the UN Human Rights Committee, which found that Paraguay had violated their rights by failing to control pesticide use from neighbouring soy plantations. In Bolivia, the Guarani of Laguna Chica had legal victories against environmental destruction.
The impact on Guarani communities has been made worse by modern slavery. The Guarani were enslaved during the rubber boom of the 1890s as a cheap labour source. In August 2025, the president of the Guarani Assembly, Nelly Romero, accused the Bolivian parliament of inaction regarding approximately 5,500 indigenous Guarani who currently live in conditions of slavery. An anthropologist, Bret Gustafson, said the Guarani have been subject to debt peonage – crushing debt it’s impossible for them to pay off.
There’s some good news. In 1999, 514 Guarani families were liberated with the purchase of 30,000 hectares by private and religious institutions. However another 900 families still work under debt peonage.
The Guarani story is one of the injustice that goes with settler colonialism, but it is exacerbated by climate change, and woven in with capitalist pillaging of the environment.
