From Wetland to Saltland: Natural Obstacles and Socioecological Consequences in the Production of Solar Salt in Venezuela

ABSTRACT

This article provides a critical analysis of the process involved in transforming small-scale artisanal production of solar salt into large-scale industrial production by Produsal in Los Olivitos Wildlife Refuge and Fishing Reserve in Lake Maracaibo, Venezuela. In doing so, it highlights the socioecological impacts resulting from this process in the wetland and the fishing community of Ancón de Iturre. Using political economy of nature as a theoretical framework, especially notions of the formal subsumption of nature, materiality of natural resources, and the commodification of nature, this article explores how the biophysical characteristic of salt and the ecosystem where it is contained present a specific set of natural obstacles for its production; the different strategies used by Produsal to overcome these obstacles; and the social and ecological contradictions embedded in the process.

KEYWORDS:

• Energy
• fishing communities
• Lake Maracaibo
• Los Olivitos wetland
• oil industry
• petrochemical industry
• political economy of nature
• solar salt
• subsumption of nature
• Venezuela

Acknowledgments

I thank Dr. Craig Revels for his insightful comments on previous drafts, edits, and discussions about ecological Marxism. I also thank Dr. Robert Hickey for his helpful comments. Special thanks to the editors, Beatriz Bustos, Wim Carton, and Erik Jönsson, for organizing the paper session from which this article evolved, for their helpful comments, and for organizing this special issue. Finally, I thank four anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments, suggestions, and constructive criticism. All mistakes and omissions are my own.

Notes

Nature can impose obstacles to capitalist accumulation by stopping or slowing down the process of capital circulation. Such obstacles can also become sources of opportunities for capital—as explained by Henderson (1998) in the case of agricultural processes in California. However, focusing on the potential sources of opportunities for Produsal goes beyond the scope of this article.

Bittern, a toxic by-product of solar salt production, refers to the water solution of bromides, magnesium, and calcium salts remaining after sodium chloride is crystalized out of seawater in concentrators and evaporators.

Here the conditions are defined in terms both social and material dimensions.

Published in Gaceta Oficial number 3934, November 20, 1986.

Published in Gaceta Oficial number 34812, October 14, 1991.

The Convention on Wetlands of International Importance is an intergovernmental treaty that provides the framework for national action and international cooperation for the conservation and wise use of wetlands and their resources. Available at https://rsis.ramsar.org/ris/859 (accessed May 5, 2016).

This law redistributed responsibilities between the national government and the states. The maintenance of mines, for example, was considered an exclusive responsibility of the states (Cruz and Legovini 2004, 315).

This figure was calculated by averaging the number of dependents of each worker in the municipality of Miranda (6.08) and the number of dependents of salineros in Ancón de Iturre (7.1). Since 45% of salineros working in solar salt production in Los Olivitos comes from other communities in the municipality of Miranda, the number used to calculate the amount of people who are dependents from salt workers in Ancón de Iturre was recalculated to 6 dependents per household.

Author interview, Ancón de Iturre, July 19, 2007.

Author interview, Los Olivitos, July 9, 2007.

Author interview, Maracaibo, December 30, 2009.