Beni Department - Population

Population

With a population of 420,000 (2006 census), Beni is the second most sparsely populated of the nine departments of Bolivia, after Pando.

Although Beni is rich in natural resources, the poverty level of its inhabitants is high, mainly as a result of the absence of adequate roads linking the department to the rest of country. The main economic activities are agriculture, timber and cattle. In addition, an underground economy linked to illegal narcotics activities flourished in the area during the last decades of the 20th century, with many cocaine laboratories hiding behind the façade of remote cattle ranches.

The Beni region features many large mounds connected by earthen causeways which were built by ancient inhabitants. The first European settlers were Spanish Jesuits sent to convert the native inhabitants, chiefly in the southern half of the department, during the 18th century. The religious origins of many of the Beni's towns can be attested to by the centrality of the local church in most of the communities, and in the very names of the towns: Trinidad, Santa Ana, San Borja, Reyes, etc. Today, the Beni region is the seat of the Roman Catholic Apostolic Vicariate of El Beni.

The importance of cattle ranching is prominent in the regional culture, and cowboys, or "Vaqueros", still play an important role in Beni society, comprising a large portion of the working class. Other industries significant to the region include logging, small-scale fishing and hunting, farming, and in recent years, eco-tourism.

Though the Beni lies in the southern reaches of the Amazon Basin, an area renowned for tropical disease, the population experiences less health problems than in the Andes Region, especially those related to malnutrition.

The inhabitants (Benianos) are mostly descendants of Cruceños (people from Santa Cruz) who streamed north following the course of navigable rivers, and native peoples. The culture is known as lowland Camba (common to Santa Cruz, Beni, and Pando) and not Andean. Benianos are simple, straightforward people whose Spanish is likely inherited from Santa Cruz which in turn inherited it from Asunción del Paraguay, the departure point of its founders, among them Ñuflo de Chávez. It has been remarked that the Camba dialect, as well as the customs of the inhabitants of Bolivia's tropical lowlands, are almost purely Andalusian.

The Beniano diet consists largely of rice, bananas, beef and fish. Some popular dishes include Majao, Masaco, and others, many featuring cured/salted meats.

The Benianos have traditionally been mistrustful, and often somewhat contemptuous, of Andean culture, considering themselves to be lighter and more purely Spanish than the Quechua and Aymara-speaking populations of the highlands. Considerable resentment existed against the central government, which allegedly did very little to build roads or integrate the Beni into the economy and political life of the country. These attitudes persisted despite the fact that Beni benefited greatly by the Agrarian Reform instituted following the 1952 Revolution, with many citizens coming into ownership of significant tracts of land. Most of these turned to cattle ranching. The absence of a reliable road linking the department to the main centers of power in the country (owing to the difficult terrain) continued to contribute to the Benianos' perception of isolation, as did the a downturn in the cattle industry. This, in turn, translated in an almost automatic support by both the population and departmental authorities for the Santa Cruz-led effort to federalize the country and devolve powers to the departments at the expense of the central government. Considerable social unrest took place in 2007 and 2008, leading some to consider separatism as plausible.