New Statesman – Hands off our gas! The battle is not really over gas, but over who calls the shots in Bolivia. And remarkably, it is the mass-based organisations, representing indigenous and peasant populations, which are setting the political agenda. Next year a constituent assembly will draw up a new constitution to incorporate them in …
I’m, not sure how useful this will be in a country where most people may not have a phone, much less an internet connection. I hope the government is using other media channels to reach rural and poor consituencies as well. From the excellent analysis found at Now It’s Your Turn The Bolivian government, through …
Bolivian Government using website for upcoming referendum Read More »
Three NGO’s argue that the United States sponsored coca eradication programs in Colomiba and the rest of the Andes do not work. Coca is compartively much easier to grow than alternative cash crops – requiring much less labor. Because it is more lucrative as well, it doesn’t make sense for a poor Andean farmer to …
Fragile Bolivia Unites, for Now, on Chile Sea Spat For 120 years, Bolivia has demanded neighboring Chile give back coastline seized in a 1879-1883 war, saying that this landlocked Andean nation needs access to the sea, and therefore an easier route to world markets, to escape centuries of poverty. The issue historically resurfaces in Bolivia …
Hopefully it won’t get worse before it gets better. I’ll give my dad and aunt another call this weekend to get their perspective on the situation. Sanchez de Lozada, a 73-year-old U.S.-educated businessman and one of the wealthiest people in the country, is disliked by millions of Bolivians who see him as a "gringo" out …
Marches and protests continue in La Paz and look to be spreading to other cities in Bolivia. Elsewhere in the capital, long lines formed outside grocery stores over worries of food shortages as demonstrators continued to block roads, choking off the city from the rest of the country. We talked to my Dad and Aunt …
Looks like my dad picked a bad time to visit the motherland: Thousands took to the streets in the capital, chanting anti-government slogans and demanding the president resign despite his announcement Monday that he will shelve controversial plans for natural gas exports. The plans to sell gas to the United States and Mexico had already …
Interesting article forwarded to me by my cousin from the WSJ on Coca Eradication failing in Bolivia. Unfortunately you need a subscription to view it online but you can get a lot of info from Google News too. And from Erythroxylum: The Coca Plant The Andean culture and the coca plant have thrived for centuries. …