Nourishing Relations: Controversy over the Conga Mining Project in Northern Peru

This article extends debates on ontological multiplicity and considers the potential and limitations of this analytical lens for understanding the dynamics of mining activity in Cajamarca, Peru. Peasant farmers from El Tambo organised themselves to protect the lagoons in the Conga project area. We examine different conceptions of ‘nourishment’ to understand people’s relationship with land and water, and the company’s environmental management plans, including a proposal to replace the lagoons with artificial reservoirs. Competing ‘designs on the land’ reveal complex relations among humans and elements of the environment, which are re-created and transformed in situations of conflict. Ethnographic attention to designs on the land elucidates the processes through which ontologies or ‘worlds’ are made. We emphasise the connection between past practices and recent events, recognising people’s long-standing relationships and commitments to the land without ignoring the political creativity that made the lagoons into a source of life to be defended.