Since 2019, the Venezuelan Guajira has been experiencing one of the harshest droughts in its history. Each day, women in the area have to walk for hours to fetch water that is often contaminated, a task that exposes them to chronic ailments and diseases
Every morning, Ana Elena walks about 15 kilometers in search of water under the sun of La Guajira, in the western Venezuelan state of Zulia, but all she finds are empty wells, “with the dry ground around it sticking out.” For the last three years, the Venezuelan Guajira has been going through one of the harshest droughts people can remember.
Although high temperatures and little rain are common in the region, its residents have never had to put up with what they call “a one-in-a-thousand-years thirst.” When water becomes this scarce in these communities, women are the people tasked with finding it.
With a surface of 2,370 km2, La Guajira is an indigenous municipality located in the north of Zulia state of just over 67,000 inhabitants -including members of the Wayúu and Añú indigenous peoples- that shares a border with Colombia. The Wayúu people are the largest ethnic group in Venezuela and their social organization is led by women.
Ana Elena has lived in different communities across the municipality in her 50 years – Paraguaipoa, Colopuntai and Maichemana – and she affirms never having seen “so much thirst”. Every day, she covers herself from head to toe with scraps of cloth on top of her traditional robe as she goes out in search of water that can at least be used for cleaning, cooking or bathing. But finding clean water in the jawei—the ponds that store rainwater or water that springs from the ground—is difficult.
“It hasn’t rained since last year, so the water we are going to see right now is from last year. There is little left and many people come here. Some animals drink that water too,” Ana Elena explains while filling her two buckets. “These two buckets of water are only enough for my two children’s baths and to wash a few clothes. I will take a shower some other day,” she says while staring at the hot, arid land.
“A drum of water of 200 liters can trade for around 7,000 pesos (almost 2 US dollars) and it is not even enough for one day. We need at least three of them every day and we have a hard time fetching water from the jawei,” Ana Elena says.
The water at the jawei has been exposed to the sunlight and no type of treatment. It looks clean from a distance, but it is not suitable for human consumption, not even after being boiled. Consuming this water has caused skin diseases in the women and children of Ana Elena’s family.
Venezuelan activists have also observed the impact of the drought on the health of Wayúu women, and have pointed out that both the lack of water for proper menstrual hygiene and the effort of carrying water expose them to infections of the urinary tract and the risk of suffering from diseases of the reproductive system.
Documenting the havoc that the lack of water has wrought on the health of Guajira women has proved challenging. One of the reasons is the lack of gynecological health data, since none of the three public hospitals in the municipality has specialized doctors, as found in 2023 by the Network of Women Builders of Peace from the Press and Society Institute (Ipys).
Meanwhile, the cost of a private gynecological consultation in Maracaibo, almost three hours away by road, ranges from $20 to $40. The experts interviewed by IPYS assure that nearly 50% of women in La Guajira do not have regular gynecological check-ups while four in every ten patients who attend consultation are diagnosed with cervical cancer.
“Many times due to lack of knowledge or cultural attitudes, patients take their health very lightly. Some go to their first consultation but do not follow the treatment indicated by their doctors, perhaps by choice or because they lack the resources. This complicates our follow-up of their cases,” explained Ymar Villalobos, a local doctor specializing in obstetrics.
“Regarding menstrual health, many myths persist and women face many barriers to having access to sanitary pads. They usually wear pads made of cloth or leaves. And they also suffer the effects of the crisis in public services, especially drinking water,” describes Roxana Vivas, an activist with the Women Riots organization, which visibilizes violence against women and defends sexual and reproductive rights as a way to reduce violent and discriminatory practices.
In La Guajira, a pack of sanitary pads enough for a five-day period usually trades for 1 US dollar or 3,500 Colombian pesos, almost the same price as half a drum of water.
Sometimes, Ana Elena accidentally urinates herself when carrying the water with both hands when she lifts the containers toward her shoulders.
“Once I was bringing a bucket with water from the jawei to fill one of my bottles and I felt as if I had urinated myself, but I was already wet from having entered the water so I didn’t pay much attention to it. But when I was emptying the bottles at home, I felt like I was urinating myself again and now every time I carry the bottles (about 18 kilograms each) I urinate myself,” Ana Elena says.
According to the 2022 report by the Venezuelan organizations Caleidoscopio Humano and Monitor Desca, one of the effects of carrying heavy weights such as buckets with water is the weakening and loss of elasticity in the muscles of the pelvic floor, which affects the sexual, gynecological and urological health of women. Ana Elena was not able to see the doctor because the consultation and treatment were very expensive.
“I can’t even buy a full pack of sanitary pads, let alone pay for a doctor. And I must also provide water to my family. I am in the hands of God,” she says.
At noon, just when the Sun begins to sting the skin, a group of girls riding a donkey stops by the banks of the only jawei that remains with some water. They are 7, 8 and 12 years old and have already made three trips to the village of Miralejos -some five kilometers away- to bring water to their homes.
“This is the last trip we are going to make, it is very hot, we are hungry and we are tired. We will take a bath and then leave,” says the 12-year-old girl before taking a dip in the turbulent waters of the jawei.
The time women and girls spend fetching water could be invested in their education, work or leisure, and the task exposes them to injuries and the dangers of the road. According to 2023 data by Unicef and the World Health Organization, women and girls under the age of 15 bear the responsibility of looking for water in 7 out of every 10 households that lack adequate water facilities across the world.
Six years without running water
Travelers coming from Maracaibo, the capital city of the state of Zulia, are greeted by a billboard that welcomes visitors to La Guajira after having driven past some 12 police checkpoints where officers usually demand money in exchange for allowing transit to people. Once in the area, the image is one of disconnection: there is no phone service from Venezuelan providers and mobile devices show the Colombian time as soon as the unpaved road begins.
Although we are talking about the Venezuelan Guajira, payments for the sale of water in water trucks are made in Colombian pesos or US dollars, which are out of the reach of most residents of the communities along the “mountain belt”, a region near Alta Guajira.
Data from the 2022 Report on Food Security in La Guajira and Isla de Toas by the Human Rights Commission of the state of Zulia (Codhez) revealed that at least 98% of the population of La Guajira municipality lives below the poverty line while 86% live below the extreme poverty line of families whose income is not enough to satisfy their most basic needs.
The residents of the area have lived among constant power blackouts during 2023. They also lack running water, wastewater networks or sanitary landfills, and trash usually piles up in open dumps.
In October 2010, heavy rains flooded La Guajira and caused serious damage to houses, cattle and other property. The emergency was so serious that the late President Hugo Chávez announced the Comprehensive Socialist Restructuring Plan to build homes, roads and “everything else that is needed.”
The plan was to be implemented by the Executive branch in collaboration with the state-owned oil company Petróleos de Venezuela (Pdvsa), the Corporation for the Development of the Zulia Region (Corpozulia) and representatives of the area. But 13 years later, La Guajira still has many needs; neither roads nor homes are in good condition.
The region’s main water treatment plant, El Brillante, has been out of service since 2017. Six years later, in 2023, the mayor of the municipality, Indira Fernández, reported that her office was “restoring the drinking water service” at the plant, but the local communities cannot remember the last time they received water from the tap and some have opted for buying bottled water “when they have the opportunity.”
“These communities have not received water through pipes for years allegedly because the municipal government with the regional water company Hidrolago and other government entities with jurisdiction on the matter claim that they are going to replace the damaged pipes with new ones, something that has not happened,” says José David González, coordinator at the Guajira Human Rights Committee.
Mr. González and more than 280 members of 180 local communal councils prepared a proposal for the development of a “Comprehensive Plan” to address the problems of the municipality, including healthcare and access to food, water and electricity. The proposal was submitted to representatives of the Venezuelan State in July 2023 and the group is still waiting for a response.
Little information is available in Venezuela on the impact of drought and floods, and experts interviewed by the Alianza Rebelde Investiga in 2022 explain that the phenomenon is not being evaluated in the light of the forecast of an increase in aridity in the country, closely related to climate change.
However, projections from organizations such as the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) point to more drought. In the next 30 years, half of the Venezuelan population will be more vulnerable to increased aridity, with problems in the supply of water and increased energy demand, with the northwestern region of Venezuela as the most affected region.
According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, the lack of rainfall in La Guajira could also generate a decrease in harvests – mainly corn, pumpkins, guajiro beans, bananas, and cassava, among others-, which could result in a decrease in the availability of food and accentuate malnutrition.
While the Colombian authorities have declared an “economic emergency” in the Colombian Guajira and have begun to study the impact of droughts on the territory, no permanent solutions are in sight on the Venezuelan side.
Venezuela is the only country in South America without a plan for climate change mitigation and adaptation.
Translated by Jose Rafael Medina
