The Tarahumara Community of Choreachi
The fight for indigenous land rights in Mexico’s Copper Canyon region
Members of the Tarahumara indigenous community of Choreachi, located near Mexico’s famed Copper Canyon, have long been fighting illegal logging of their old growth pine forest lands. Although the people of Choreachi have been in possession of their territory since time immemorial, they have still not obtained legal recognition of their rights to the land.
Alianza Sierra Madre is a local organization working to protect the rights of indigenous peoples in the Sierra Tarahumara. In 2007, Alianza requested international legal help from EDLC on behalf of the Choreachi community in the effort to finally resolve their land claims.
The Indigenous Community of Choreachi
The Tarahumara pueblo of Choreachi is one of the most traditional indigenous communities in the Sierra Tarahumara. It is governed 
by its traditional authorities, and the Owirúame (shamans) who have an active presence in the community’s daily life. Eighty per cent of Choreachi’s lands are still covered by ancient old-growth pine forest, where over one hundred twenty species of migratory birds have been identified. The Choreachi’s forests are home to six threatened, nineteen endangered, and fourteen protected species.
The indigenous people of Choreachi are determined to protect their land, which they believe was planted by Onoruame (God) as a sacred natural gift. Choreachi is both a cultural and an ecological treasure of international importance.
The Struggle for Land Rights
In the 1990s, the Mexican agrarian authorities certified a process- obtained through fraud- in which the people of Choreachi were stripped of their agrarian rights over their land. Choreachi has remained a “de facto” community, with no title over the 80,000 acres it has traditionally occupied.
Additionally, Choreachi is threatened by the neighboring ejido (peasant community) of Coloradas de los Chávez that covets its forests. Coloradas claims an area of 38,000 acres of Choreachi’s lands and forests based upon fraudulent documents in which false boundaries were set. These boundaries have been ratified by Mexican agrarian authorities. As a result, Coloradas de los Chávez obtained logging permits over Choreachi’s forests for over twenty years.
The people of Choreachi have recently taken a new legal approach, filing a collective land rights claim that raises land issues in terms of indigenous rights. The claim challenges the false boundaries and seeks recognition of the people of Choreachi’s entitlement to these long held communal lands. In 2007, a court order put the logging permit on hold until the land claims are resolved.
Choreachi of Mexico
- Experts’ Report Concerning the Land and Natural Resource Rights of the Community of Choreachi, Mexico under International Law, prepared by DLA Piper US (2007)