Seconded By: Jean Pierre Rieu,
A fire serpent crosses the Córdoba mountains each year, devastating the native forest: 750 thousand hectares have burned in the last decade. These fires are not coincidental but a direct consequence of the extractivist model that sacrifices ancestral forests to expand the agricultural and real estate frontier in Córdoba.
After the devastating fires of 2020, more than 25 community brigades emerged as an organizational response to the socio-environmental crisis. These brigades, composed mainly of women, not only fight the flames but also denounce the economic interests that perpetuate intentional fires.
In this context, Las Fuegas was born, an ecotransfeminist collective that connects territorial defense with the fight against patriarchal violence. Its origin dates back to the March 8, 2022 march, when they demanded “justice for Luana·, a firefighter who committed suicide after abuse by the highest authority of Córdoba’s Civil Defense.
Las Fuegas represents a transmutation of danger into collective care, a space where patriarchal violence is made visible while defending the native forest. Their central message is forceful: neither the forest nor bodies are territories of conquest. This collective embodies a new form of resistance that articulates ecology and feminism in the defense of life.
Human vulnerability
Human vulnerability in the face of the immense chaos of environmental catastrophes.
After a fire burned out of control in Ascochinga (57 km from the city of Córdoba) for several days in August 2024, a member of the forestry brigade advances over the field to monitor the fire front and the terrain’s topography, in order to lead the rest of the crew in direct combat.
In 2024 alone, more than 93,000 hectares of native forest burned in Córdoba. Intentionally started fires are used as a tool to clear land for later development by real estate, agricultural, livestock or mining businesses. In Argentina, one hectare of forest is destroyed every two minutes — the equivalent of 30 football pitches per hour (Greenpeace, 2023).
The forest resists
Negra Euge, a member of Fuegas, manages to find an internet signal amidst the flames to inform her family that she is safe and that they will return soon, as there is nothing more they can do. The phrase “El monte resiste” (The forest resists) is inscribed on her helmet, and is used as a slogan and banner of struggle in the Córdoba mountains.
Direct combat
The community forest brigades were formed after the devastating fires of 2020. Neighbours decided to organise, train and fight forest fires to protect what little remains of the native forest.
Since then, each town has had a forestry brigade seeking to protect the remaining native forest.
Fuegas
Virchu, Yeni, Giuli, Vic, Vale, Euge, and Simone (litlle dog) are members of Fuegas. This collective was born as an organization of women firefighters that seeks to address the problem of forest fires from an eco-transfeminist perspective.
It is this intersection between environmental and gender issues that has given them significant visibility as leaders in their field. They frequently use the slogan “Neither the forest nor our bodies are territories of conquest.”
They were founded in March 2022, following the Luana Ludueña case, which motivated them to take to the streets in search of justice. This motivated other women to speak out about the violence they experienced in their own organizations, and they soon became leaders in their work in an environment as sexist as that experienced during forest fires. They are currently made up of 18 people, each of whom belongs to a community brigade in their locality. Some of them were left without a brigade due to a situation of violence, and decided to form the first community forestry brigade of women in Argentina, which they call Mampa, which in the ancestral Sanavirona language means “Running Water.”
word circle
One morning in July 2023, a day of training and tool practice was held for brigades in El Carapé Ascochinga: Fuegas, Inchin, Chiviquin, Isquitipe, Chavascate, Kamchira, Colibrí and Aromito brigades were present, along with more than 58 forest brigaders from across the Sierras Chicas corridor. Before the training began, the seven brigades gathered in a circle. The bodies arranged in a circle allow for mutual listening and observation. This reflects the horizontal moments in these types of practices, where there is no hierarchical command, but rather a circulation of words and collective decision-making.
Stars like fire
Four brigade members of Fuegas, in the town of La Rinconada, north of Córdoba, light up the sky with their flashlights.
This happened on their way back from first aid training, to which the firefighters of La Rinconada, a town north of Córdoba, had invited them. On the way back, they stopped to look at the constellations, searching for shapes resembling the fire.