Roundtable on Racism and Territorial Struggles, Ecuador

This event was a roundtable discussion in relation to the case of Wimbí, in Esmeraldas province (the northern Pacific region of Ecuador). The roundtable was moderated by a representative of the Ombudsman’s office, and the discussants were María Moreno from project LAPORA, Rolan Merlin, a local authority of Wimbí, and Jeaneth Yépez, an anthropologist who has worked on inter-ethnic relations in Esmeraldas. There were around 30 participants including public officials, postgraduate students, scholars, and members of the community. Participants inquired about the possibility of presenting the case of Wimbí in the province of Imbabura, in the northern highlands of Ecuador, where mining activities in ancestral lands of Afro-Ecuadorian populations have increased. The representative of the Vicariate of Esmeraldas, Isabel Padilla, who has supported the struggles of communities of the north of Esmeraldas, believed that it would be productive to show the social and environmental impacts of mining in Wimbí to the Afrodescendant populations of Imbabura.