In the southeast of Mexico, as in several other parts of the world, the insatiable lust for profitability falsely couched as development brutally intrudes upon the traditional territory to re-configure it for wealth appropriation and accumulation. Large-scale extraction and associated transport infrastructures that are aimed at redesigning the routes and contents of global trade grossly violate ways of life of the native communities while destroying the natural conditions that sustained life on the blue planet for millions of years.
The southeast of Mexico, a place of ancient civilizations and enormous biodiversity, is under unbearable siege by two major interconnected projects: the Maya Train and the Interoceanic Corridor of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec. It is a war by other means which is called ‘development’.
The territorial key
Mexico is a megadiverse country, with more than 5,000 species of native (endemic) plants, diverse ecosystems (including marine ones), and a species diversity that exceeds 70% of those known on the planet.
The tropical rainforest of the Americas extends from the Amazon basin to the southeast of Mexico and constitutes one of the most biodiverse areas on the planet. In its northernmost part, the Selva Maya, which covers a vast portion of the peninsular territory, is the largest tropical rainforest in Mesoamerica and the second largest on the continent. With an area of 42,300 km², it comprises 20 ecosystems. This rainforest connects with its counterpart in South America through biological routes in the Central American area. The connection in this extensive territory is an essential support for eco-systemic creativity, as it allows diversification and the development of varieties that strengthen biological evolution and creativity, which are dangerously threatened by contemporary ecological catastrophe. This abundance of natural life is accompanied by and responds to its cultural diversity, which has survived 530 years of permanent colonization. Mexico has 26 million people recognized officially as indigenous (one-fourth of the total population), and 61 linguistic cultures, 44 of which inhabit the southeast region. These are living cultures and peoples who have continued to maintain their ways of life in interaction with those of the colonizers, whose most recent wave appears in the form of megaprojects known as the Maya Train and the Interoceanic Corridor of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec.
This region was impacted 65 million years ago by a meteorite that caused the extinction of the dinosaurs and led to the formation of underground caves called cenotes, which create a unique system of flooded caves, the longest on the planet. The soil is porous, making these caves receptacles of crystal-clear waters, housing not only Mexico’s largest underground aquifer but also unique species and remnants of human life dating back approximately 13,000 years.
Bordering the coast, which is part of the Caribbean Sea, is the world’s second-largest coral reef, home to a wide variety of marine species. Bacalar Lagoon, known for its waters’ seven different colors, produced by a significant bacterial reef inside it (the world’s largest), is also on the list of world wonders. In addition to the Selva Maya, this area contains extensive mangrove areas, 55% of Mexico’s total (Mexico ranks fourth globally), which not only protect against hurricanes but also have the ability to capture four times more carbon than other plant species.
The Isthmus of Tehuantepec region is different. It is crossed by mountains that have created numerous ecological niches, making the Chimalapas rainforest the most biodiverse in Mesoamerica. This region has a millennia-old history. It has been home to the Maya, Zoque, Zapotec, and other civilizations for over 3,000 years. It was also the homeland of the Olmec civilization, one of the most iconic in the pre-Columbian world. Considering the archaeological heritage in the area, in addition to what current inhabitants know but is not included in records, this appears to have been a densely populated region where the jungle was cultivated as part of life’s care. For these civilizations, there was no separation between nature and society because everything belonged to Mother Earth, and humans were as much a part of her children as the rest of the species. They all needed each other and complemented each other; the care of one was the care of all, and many of the current inhabitants continue to act and think this way.
The Mexican Caribbean stretches for 1,176 km and represents 10.57% of the country’s coastline. Its exuberance and beauty have made it a highly valued tourist attraction. Cancun initiated the push for tourism 50 years ago, and today the Maya Train project aims to extend tourist activity along the entire coast. What is not mentioned is the environmental devastation, the disruptive impact, and the growth of criminality (drug addiction, prostitution, and violence) that this tourism has had on the communities and towns inhabiting the area.
The Maya Train and Interoceanic Corridor megaprojects cause irreversible ecological damage to this territory that is invaluable for maintaining the planet’s vital health. The destruction of mangroves; fragmentation of ecosystems; the vibration, barrier, and noise effects produced by trains; the deforestation of jungles and biosphere reserves; social redesign; and urbanization resulting from the reordering of activities, all contribute to the process of the sixth extinction and global turmoil predicted by scientists, instead of helping to stop the environmental catastrophe.
Furthermore, the cultural damage is immense as it destroys the buildings and testimonies of the millennia-long journey of civilizations that have resisted the genocidal onslaught of capitalist colonization for 530 years. This genocide is not only carried out through the physical annihilation of peoples and the dispossession of their territories, but also through the erasure of their history, their constructions, their references, their ways of life, and their senses of reality. It is a war by development based on profitability that is being engineered to destroy peoples, physically, socially, culturally and spiritually.
THE GEOPOLITICAL KEY
In addition to the notable and invaluable socio-biodiversity of these territories, they are also rich in strategic materials. The country’s oil reserves are concentrated in the southeast, as are some other highly prized minerals, making them part of the considerations for becoming a prominent node in the so-called supply chains that mainly connect Mexico’s wealth sources with the United States economy.
Mexico’s geography gives it a special place. On the one hand it is the link to the United States, still the world’s largest market, and on the other, it has extensive coastlines that make it accessible to maritime trade (80% of world trade transits by sea). Additionally to its diversity, the Mexican territory displays a silhouette that narrows at the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, which has been envisioned since the European invasion as suitable for facilitating interoceanic exchange.
At various times in history, efforts have been made to establish a passage corridor in the Isthmus, but the project did not prosper due to the mountainous and highly complex topography of that strip, resistance from the peoples inhabiting it, or nationwide mobilizations. However, the new conditions of hegemonic rivalries in the world and the enormous growth in the volume of transported goods have renewed its importance. The economy has gradually shifted from the Atlantic to the Pacific in recent decades, leaving the east coast of the United States, responsible for 38% of its Gross Domestic Product, in unfavorable circumstances, even with connections via Panama. However, the Panama Canal is already insufficient, as it is currently on the brink of collapse, and other possible channels or corridors through Central America have not been able to gain momentum.
Mexico is located within the territory of North America, much closer to the United States than Panama, and the crossing is only 300 km long, so it can be a very good substitute, regardless of whether this damages the Selva Chimalapa and the lives of the region’s peoples. For Mexico, from the government’s perspective, the corridor is favorable for transporting its oil to both oceans. The corridor is envisioned as a maquila or assembly zone, where goods are processed while migrants from the south are retained, presumably with precarious jobs. In other words, conditions of very low labor costs, agility in crossing, and controlled connection between the two oceans are offered, with an estimated circulation of 1.4 million containers per year. The northern border, between the United States and Mexico, shifts southward. Its control is in the hands of Mexican authorities, including the retention or deportation of migrants.
The question is whether, as in Panama, the security of world market goods crossing will be entrusted to Mexican security forces, at the risk of being overwhelmed by the forces of criminal groups, or if it will be entrusted to American troops as part of their agenda of turning the entire territory of North America, comprising Mexico, Canada and the USA into their own amplified homeland. And it is worth asking in both cases whether these security forces would actually be the armed forces. In other words, will the Isthmus of Tehuantepec fall under the care and supervision of the United States Joint Command?
The Mayan homeland has been converted into a territorial and geopolitical key that unlocks the pathway to conquer, commodify, control, and thereby destroy everything that sustains life, not only of the native communities, but also of the entire globe. Resistance to such barbarism not only from the affected communities, but also from across the borders.
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Ana Esther Ceceña is the Director of the Observatorio Latinoamericano de Geopolítica and Professor/Researcher at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México.
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