La angustia de La Angostura: consecuencias socioambientales por la construcción de presas en Sonora

Abstract

The principal rivers in the state of Sonora have all been dammed for irrigation and hydroelectric power projects. This article specifically explores the social and environmental consequences of Sonora’s first dam, La Angostura, on the Bavispe Tributary of the Yaqui River. Constructed in the late 1930´s and 1940´s, La Angostura helped control the flow of water to down-river agriculturalists in the Yaqui Valley. But it also disrupted the lives of campesinos living and working in the inundated area, and helped to transform the environment of the Yaqui Valley.