Yuluka Protecting the Heart of the World: dialogue as a key tool for the protection and recuperation of the Sierra Nevada

The Amazon Conservation Team (ACT), the National Commission for Indigenous Territories (CNTI), and Tenure Facility teams shared spaces of dialogue with the Kogui, Arhuaco, and Wiwa peoples in the heart of the Sierra Nevada. These meetings led to meaningful reflections and important lessons about how to care for and protect a deeply sacred territory.

Read the original version in Spanish here 

We’re in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, located in northern Colombia, a world unto itself. It is home to a crown of snow-capped peaks rising from the mainland, 36 rivers that snake down to the sea, and mountains that meet the Caribbean. In just 42 linear kilometres, this territory brings together what other continents hold apart.

Besides its remarkable geographic and environmental richness, the Sierra Nevada holds invaluable history and a deeply spiritual essence.   For the the Kogui, Arhuaco, Wiwa and Kankuamo peoples – its guardians – this is the heart of the world.

For them the Sierra pulses with life through its rivers, peaks, lagoons, and forest. It beats relentlessly with energy, giving life to every corner of the planet.

Despite its immense cultural and environmental value, these territories face constant threats:  forests are cut down, rivers are dammed, and ancestral guardians are systematically dispossessed of their lands. Yet the four peoples of the Sierra remain steadfast, defending this sacred territory, reclaiming what has been lost, and ensuring the heart of the world continues to beat.

To support this path of resistance and territorial defence, the Indigenous Peoples of the Sierra have shared valuable lessons with us. They teach us the true meaning of caring for the land: reminding us that spirituality is deeply tied to the territory, that what is lost can be restored, and that ongoing dialogue with them is essential to protect the land and preserve its balance.

First lesson: territory and spirituality are one.

For the four Indigenous Peoples who inhabit it, the Sierra Nevada is much more than the sum of its physical elements.

“The Sierra is our casa grande (big house) that protects us. It is where we rest, where we think, where we dream… It is an energetic place that allows us to give life not only to the peoples of the Sierra, but to everything that exists on the planet,” explains Jacinto Zarabata, spiritual authority of the Kogui people.

To them, the Sierra Nevada is the birthplace and meeting point of all material and spiritual forces that sustain the world and the universe.

This interconnection is made visible through the Linea Negra (Black Line), a continuous network of Sacred Sites -lagoons, river mouths, rocks, hills and ancient trees- that encircle the Sierra Nevada from the sea to its summit. These are living spaces where ancestral memory and spiritual knowledge reside.

For generations the Indigenous Peoples of the Sierra have fought to recover and protect these sacred places, and the Sierra as a whole. In 2018, after a long struggle, the Colombian government legally recognised the Black Line and its spiritual and cultural significance through Decree 1500. However, as Indigenous authorities point out, this recognition is only a “minimal recognition”, as there is still a long way to go and many territories left to formalise.

Moving forward, it is essential to embrace the Indigenous worldview: uphold that the physical and the spiritual are inseparable. Denying the spiritual dimension means ignoring the very essence of the Sierra Nevada. Thus, the Sierra must be protected not in fragments, but as a whole.

Second lesson: what is lost can be recovered

Since the Spanish conquest, the Sierra Nevada has endured dispossession and destruction. Communities were pushed to higher altitudes, losing their territory, cultural practices and connection to their ancestral land.

Today, these dynamics persist. The Sierra faces mounting threats: agricultural expansion, deforestation, biodiversity loss, and expansion of touristic areas.  These all disrupt ecological and spiritual balance and harm the four Indigenous Peoples directly.

As Mama Salé Zarabata, a Kogui spiritual authority shares: “nowadays you don’t see the Sacred Sites as they used to be. There are already sites that have been destroyed, that no longer exist…[and] many of us lost our territory.”

Yet in the face of this situation, the Kogui, Arhuaco, Wiwa and Kankuamo have fought to recover their land.  Thanks to their efforts, some degraded Sacred Sites have been restored, and life has returned to where it had vanished.

One example is Jaba Tañiwashkaka, a place filled with energy and life. It was the first Sacred Site within the Black Line to be legally protected as a Resguardo, a legally recognised Indigenous territory in Colombia.

Jaba Tañiwashkaka holds deep significance for the four Indigenous Peoples. They believe it is the origin point of much of the planet’s fauna, flora, lagoons and mangroves.

Before the Amazon Conservation Team supported their efforts in 2012, this place had been stripped bare. The soil was dry, animals hunted and gone, the land poisoned. It seemed beyond saving.

But once returned to the Kogui, this once dead space has reborn. Today, life abounds, animals have returned, and the forests and water have begun to heal.

Today it spans 256.4 hectares of wetlands, coastal lagoons, mangrove and tropical dry – home to species like the river otter, caiman, blue crab, Rufous-vented Chachalaca bird (guajira guacharaca) and mangrove hummingbird.

Through places Jaba Tañiwashkaka is living proof of a powerful truth: what is wounded can heal, and what is lost can be restored—when the land is returned to its guardians.

Third lesson: Dialogue and knowledge sharing: a guide for the way forward

The Indigenous Peoples of the Sierra also teach us that dialogue is essential. Through their traditional authorities and organisations that represent them, they invite us to think not as isolated individuals, but as one great community, bound together by our dependence on nature.

Their wisdom calls us into dialogue and knowledge-sharing, to unite efforts and care for our shared home, the planet, from our own places and responsibilities.

Agreements are the way forward. By building shared understandings around common goods, like water, air, and territory, we can open the space to rethink our choices, reassess our priorities, and embrace a path where nature is not only a resource but a living end in itself. A path where all life matters and the collective well-being of humanity is the higher law.

Indigenous Peoples remind us that there is still time to listen, to engage in dialogue, and to offer support. They show us that this heart, the land, can still heal and continue giving life; the same life that sustains us all.

We must open ourselves to true dialogue, to sharing, to learning from each other. Only then can we build a legacy of balance and harmony, where the territory returns to those who have protected it for generations.

*Read the original article in Spanish in Amazon Conservation Team’s website: https://colombia.amazonteam.org/collection/stories/448