Erdiz, a pulse between traditional grazing and mining extractivism

Euskaraz irakurri: Erdiz, abeltzaintza tradizionalaren eta meatze-estraktibosmoaren arteko pultsua

the pasture of Erdiz, close to Mount Alduide, is the best valued by local farmers in baztan, in addition to Special Conservation Area (ZEC) as part of the Natura 2000 Network, but its future is uncertain by constituting one of the locations of the Artesiaga mining project.

This company initiative Magnesites Navarres (MAGNA) belonging to the Roullier Group, a French multinational, intends to extract up to 600,000 tons of ore per year for 25 years, but a large part of the local population together with environmental organizations have spoken out against it.

Faced with the open opposition of the Baztán City Council, MAGNA wants to process the permits as a Supramunicipal Incidence Sector Project (PSIS); In October of last year, 80 percent of the Navarrese regional parliament endorsed its declaration as an Investment of Provincial Interest, with EH Bildu, Podemos-Ahal Dugu and Izquierda-Ezkerra voting against.

According to EFE sources from the company, its current site de Eugui, which employs “232 people, mainly from the Baztán, Erro or Esteríbar Valleys”, will run out in “six or seven years.”

The sources add that “a proposal has been made by specialists in pastures to align the project and the action with the requests made” by the municipalities and ranchers of the Valley and maintain that they will increase “the reception capacity of the pasture by 60 percent”. .

“From an environmental point of view, there is no real alternative to the current site outside the Natura 2000 Network space,” they assert, adding that their idea is to apply “an integrated restoration model.”

Local community opposition

MAGNA already tried to carry out this project in 2005, when it had the support of the General Board of the Baztán Valley, and the following year the Erdiz Bizirik platform as popular opposition.

Jon Elizetxe, a rancher from Baztán and spokesperson for the platform, explained to EFE that in 2008 MAGNA discarded the location of Erdiz and tried to develop a new project in Cilveti, but a Supreme Court ruling “managed to stop it in 2015” by affecting the same SAC Monte Alduide.

Thus, the company resumed its initial idea in Erdiz a year and a half ago, this time without arousing “support in the Valley among the population or among the members of the General Board,” according to the mayor of Baztán, Joseba Otondo.

With a 5.8% of the active population professionally dedicated to the primary sectorOtondo describes the socioeconomic structure of Baztán as “diversified”, although with a “much greater” importance of livestock than in the rest of Navarra, where the percentage “barely reaches 2%”, which is why it directly affects or indirectly to other economic sectors, such as local businesses or tourism.

So if it goes ahead mining “mortgages them in the future” and gives them “little in the present”by being based on a model that creates “sacrificial zones” and “to the detriment of local communities, but in favor of the boards of directors and shareholders” of MAGNA.

Otondo recalled that the General Meeting raised a “referendum binding” from the Foral Law regulating these initiatives, but it was not possible to convene it due to “receiving the refusal of the central government”, so they were testing “the non-binding referendum consultation model and consultation through the village mayors”, which had to be suspended because “have not been allowed”.

Guk argi dugu: ez dugu meategi proiektuaren alde bozkatuko. Gure lurrak, gure erabakiak. Bozkatu ez, bozkatu #ErdizBizirik!#A20HerriGaldeketak pic.twitter.com/MAqLtH7Uhu

— Erdiz Bizirik (@ErdizBizirik) November 10, 2022

Despite this, the opposition to the project continues, with the protest also from environmental entities such as SEO/BirdLifewhose delegate for Navarra and the Basque Country, Kiko Álvarez, does not believe that a proper restoration of the mining area is possible.

“From the natural point of view, in five years you will not be able to compensate for what Nature has generated in thousands of years,” he stresses.

Álvarez describes the project as “savagery” and warns that it will imply “eating the mountain, dismantling the top of the green zone and generating some hills that will influence the hydrology of the space”, in addition to the expansion of the access road, which would affect the nearby beech forest, also from the Red Natura 2000, and biodiversity, both local and migratory.