Chapter 2 - Resistance

"Does this look like Chile to you?", Leo asked, pointing to the landscape stretching out behind viña Flora, the vineyard we were harvesting that morning. I felt like he was testing me. The sprawling bush vines on the ground undoubtedly looked like Itata. But the eucalyptus and pine trees surrounding the vineyard looked suspiciously Christmassy. "It looks very... European?" I ventured. "And Australian. In any event, not Chilean" Leo responded.

Commercial forestry is a major industry in Itata - and the second largest export industry for Chile. Large swathes of old vines and natural forests have been pulled out and replaced by fast growing non-indigenous tree varieties such as pine and eucalyptus. Not only does this mean a huge loss of old vines, these commercial forests deplete the soils, hoard water and destroy the natural ecosystem of Itata.

And they burn like matchsticks. In February 2023, Leo was standing in the same spot we were standing now. From here, he saw the flames devouring the pines and eucalyptus trees, ripping through his old vines vineyard, fuelled by the Pacific winds. The blaze left all his grapes burnt, leaves turned to white dust, thick trunks dead and blackened. There should have been more space between the trees and the vines, but calls for more firebreaks went unanswered and subsidies for forestry went up.

That day in February 2023, Leo and his family lost everything they had worked so hard for. But just like the hardy vines, whose centuries old root systems had survived the fire, they did not give up.

And there we were, 10 March 2025, harvesting luscious healthy fruit from viña Flora, from its vines with blackened trunks, surrounded still by young pine and eucalyptus trees. "Sometimes the greatest act of resistance is just continuing," Leo said, as he carried a basket of grapes to the truck.