El Pangui, between progress and my change of scenery

The influence and trail of Mirador, the largest mine in Ecuadorit can be seen in El Pangui, a small canton (municipality) which, after the arrival of Chinese investments, experienced a boost in development and, at the same time, an affected part of the green landscape, which now coexists with an open-pit mine, which tons of copper concentrate leave daily.

Located in the southern province of Zamora Chinchipe, El Pangui is descended from the great Shuar tribe that inhabited the place, alien to the riches of the bowels of their land. Its name comes from the Shuar terminology ‘Panki’, which means boa or place of boa, animals that lived in a huge whirlpool located on the slopes of the Zamora River.

In that canton, a project is being developed managed by the Chinese consortium Ecuacorriente (ECSA), which has three concessions covering some 6,600 hectaresof which about 1,400 intervened for the construction of the Mirador mine.

The first investigative activities started in 1995. They did not ask for the opening of roads or major clearing.but when the copper deposit was discovered, there was a radical change in land use and landscape: tailings dumps (mining waste dumps), waste dumps, roads, mine pits and other works were built.

“The construction phase of the pit began in 2015, when the vegetation, then the soil, and then the sterile layer began to be removed, in order to start work in the mineralized area in 2019,” explained Vilma Pazmiño, head of environmental management at Lookout.

There, EFE confirmed that, especially in the area of ​​the mine pit – which is currently 535 meters deep and has several slopes -, the green vegetation of the mountain has disappeared to make way for roads along which large vehicles circulate by removing mineralized and sterile stones.

Dump trucks and electric trucks with a capacity of 220 tons are now part of the landscape of this area, where the noise of the vehicles and the controlled blasting of rock breaking have also displaced the symphony of nature in that place.

Revegetation and afforestation
But while the work is progressing, so is ECSA’s work on vegetation restoration. They stabilize the slopes and, using the ‘hydroseeding’ technique, use a pressure hose to launch the seeds of autochthonous plants that the women collect in the surrounding area. About two years after the area is reforested, the reforestation process begins.

On the tour that EFE was invited to, the contrast between the hillsides overgrown with greenery and the areas that remained untouched, with the original lush secondary forest, was evident.

On the 300 hectares that have been greened so far and 100 afforested, Work in the same direction is being added to landfills that are “in the process” of being like before, according to Pazmiño.

However, it is estimated that 1% of the total slopes that the mine will have will not be able to be restored due to their instability, so they will be concreted.

Nursery and botanical garden
In its efforts to restore the area, ECSA has created a nursery where it produces around 10,000 annual plants with seeds collected in the same areas before the intervention. The nursery – from which the plants are grown for reforestation in other areas of the province – is staffed by women, the elderly, the indigenous Shuar people and people with disabilities.

ECSA also manages a 35-hectare botanical garden, with local herbs, and with domestic and rescued fauna such as parrots, snakes or frogs, which the population brings to the place, where a permanent group of veterinarians is in charge of their rehabilitation.

An ongoing study by a private university to determine the behavior, number and coexistence of species after Mirador’s arrival shows, so far, “that the modification of the entire belt surrounding the project is insignificant,” Pazmiño said.

Copper and development
ECSA contributes 1.2% of Ecuador’s gross domestic product (GDP) and is the fourth largest exporting company in the country. In 2022, it paid about 300 million dollars for taxes and other payments to the state.

By October last year, it had generated 3,910 sources of direct employment and around 16,000 indirect jobs.

For Marilyn Tirado, who studied at the university thanks to ECSA scholarship and is now the Community Relations Coordinator at Mirador, “The province (Zamora Chinchipe) revolves around mining.”

“There are plenty of jobs,” said Mauro Segovia, 33, who told EFE that before the arrival of the mining company, the town was a “minimum town.”