Argentina Protesters Resist Milei’s Land Sale Drive

Published: 06 October 2026. The English Chronicle Desk. The English Chronicle Online.

Across Argentina, a growing movement of environmental activists, Indigenous communities, workers and human rights campaigners is challenging President Javier Milei’s efforts to loosen restrictions on foreign ownership of land and expand opportunities for international investment in the country’s vast reserves of water, minerals, forests and energy resources.

For protesters, the dispute is about far more than property rights. They argue that Argentina’s natural resources are part of the national commons and that allowing increasingly unrestricted foreign ownership could threaten access to water, displace Indigenous communities and deepen control of strategic territory by wealthy investors and multinational companies.

The debate was particularly visible on 19 September, when thousands of people took part in demonstrations in different parts of the country. In Esquel, a town surrounded by the Andes in Chubut province, 84-year-old chemistry professor and longtime environmental activist Marta Sahores joined workers, retirees, students, Indigenous groups and human rights organisations during what protesters called the “march of anger”.

Sahores has spent more than two decades campaigning against large-scale mining projects. During the demonstration, she carried messages opposing the sale of land and warning about the consequences of transferring control of natural resources to foreign investors.

Her concerns are rooted in the close connection between land and water in Patagonia, where privately controlled territories can include rivers, lakes and environmentally sensitive areas.

The protest movement is seeking to challenge parts of Milei’s sweeping deregulation agenda, particularly measures that campaigners say weaken existing safeguards over rural land and natural resources.

The issue has become increasingly contentious since Milei came to power in December 2023 and began pursuing an aggressively pro-investment economic programme. His administration has sought to reduce regulation, attract international capital and open resource-rich areas to large private projects.

Supporters of the reforms argue that Argentina needs foreign investment to revive its economy, create employment and develop industries that have suffered from years of economic instability. Critics, however, fear that the policies could transfer control of strategically important territory and resources away from local communities and public institutions.

Foreigners already own millions of hectares of Argentine land. Estimates cited by researchers put foreign ownership at roughly 13 million hectares, equivalent to around 5% of the country’s territory.

Argentina’s 2011 Land Law introduced restrictions on foreign ownership of rural land. Among other provisions, it limited foreign ownership to 15% of land within an individual administrative department and restricted the share that could be controlled by citizens of any one nationality.

Researchers argue that those limits have already been exceeded in some areas.

In Lácar, in the Patagonian province of Neuquén, foreign ownership is estimated to account for more than half of the land. The area contains glacial lakes, native forests and other environmentally important landscapes. A significant proportion of the foreign-owned territory is concentrated among a relatively small number of US entities.

The scale of these holdings has become a source of concern for Indigenous communities, particularly the Mapuche, who have longstanding claims to ancestral territories and have fought for greater access to essential resources such as clean water.

The political battle intensified after Argentina’s Supreme Court overturned a previous ruling that had blocked Milei’s efforts to repeal the Land Law. The decision removed a major legal obstacle to the government’s deregulation plans and opened the way for further changes to land ownership rules.

The government’s wider property reforms have also generated controversy in Congress.

Milei’s La Libertad Avanza party secured Senate approval in August for a reduced version of legislation designed to strengthen protections for private property. Two particularly contentious provisions were removed during the legislative process. One would have increased the maximum amount of land that foreigners could own, while another would have accelerated land development following wildfires.

Even after those provisions were withdrawn, critics continued to object to other measures contained in the legislation. These include provisions that could make evictions faster and increase the difficulty of expropriating private land for public infrastructure projects.

The land dispute forms part of a much broader economic strategy pursued by Milei.

In 2024, his government introduced a major investment incentive framework known as Rigi. The programme was designed to attract large-scale investors by offering a range of benefits, including favourable tax treatment, easier movement of capital and exemptions for certain imported machinery. Investors can also receive long periods of regulatory stability.

The government has sought to extend this model through proposals for even larger projects in strategically important industries, including artificial intelligence data centres and semiconductor manufacturing.

Such projects could require substantial quantities of water and critical minerals, increasing concerns among environmental groups about how much control private investors could eventually gain over natural resources.

Argentina possesses some of the world’s most important deposits of lithium and has substantial oil and gas reserves, particularly in the Vaca Muerta formation. The country’s natural-resource wealth has made it increasingly attractive to international investors.

Technology billionaire Peter Thiel, for example, recently acquired a stake in an Argentine oil producer involved in the country’s major fossil fuel reserves. Such investments fit within Milei’s strategy of positioning Argentina as a destination for global capital.

But environmental and Indigenous campaigners fear that economic development could come at the expense of communities that already live on or depend upon the land.

Professor Pablo Volkind of the University of Buenos Aires has argued that the consequences of deregulation are already visible. According to his assessment, disputes involving Indigenous communities and property claims have intensified in provinces including Jujuy, Neuquén, Chubut and Misiones.

For communities facing eviction, the debate is not theoretical. Some land disputes have existed for decades, but campaigners say the political environment created by Milei’s reforms has made them more vulnerable to legal action.

The Land Observatory at the University of Buenos Aires has mapped areas of foreign ownership and highlighted overlaps with natural reserves, national parks, glacier zones and territories where Indigenous communities are present.

Many of the areas with high foreign ownership stretch along the Andes, from the northern provinces of Salta and Jujuy through Patagonia and toward Tierra del Fuego. These regions contain valuable mineral deposits as well as important freshwater resources.

Milei’s government has also backed changes affecting glacier protections, allowing mining activity in areas that environmental campaigners had previously considered off limits.

Another major concentration of foreign-owned land exists around the Paraná River basin in the provinces of Misiones, Corrientes and Entre Ríos. The region is economically important because the river system plays a major role in Argentina’s agricultural and export infrastructure.

In Puerto Libertad, Misiones, foreign ownership has become so extensive that local officials have faced difficulties pursuing public development projects. The situation has raised questions about how much practical authority municipalities retain when large private landowners control significant areas surrounding communities.

The controversy also has a historical dimension.

Indigenous leaders argue that foreign ownership cannot be separated from Argentina’s long history of territorial dispossession. Mapuche leader Moira Ivana Millán describes the current debate as a continuation of a much older process in which Indigenous communities were displaced from ancestral lands during the formation and expansion of the Argentine state.

Critics point to high-profile cases involving wealthy foreign landowners as examples of the tensions that can emerge when private property rights intersect with public access and environmental protections.

One of the most controversial cases involves the Patagonian estate associated with British billionaire Joe Lewis. Campaigners have long disputed restrictions on access to Lago Escondido and have argued that public interests have been compromised by private control of the surrounding land.

Under Milei, the government has moved away from some earlier legal challenges involving the property, reinforcing concerns among activists that the administration is willing to prioritise private ownership and investment over competing public claims.

Indigenous communities have also lost protections under the current government.

In 2024, Milei’s administration repealed measures that had temporarily prevented Indigenous evictions while authorities conducted a national survey of traditional territories. The government also dismantled a national registry connected to Indigenous communities.

For Indigenous leaders, the changes have left communities with fewer legal safeguards at a time when land disputes are becoming increasingly intense.

In Neuquén, members of Mapuche communities have faced threats of removal despite previous official recognition of their legal status and traditional occupation of particular territories. Community leaders argue that the absence of formal property titles leaves them vulnerable to claims by private landowners.

The government, however, presents its economic agenda as an effort to restore investment, strengthen private property rights and bring capital into an economy that has endured prolonged inflation and financial instability.

The tension between those objectives and environmental and social concerns is becoming one of the defining debates around Milei’s presidency.

Economic incentives can potentially generate investment and employment, but critics question how much the state ultimately gives up in exchange for attracting major corporations and wealthy investors.

The Center for Argentine Political Economy has estimated that the Rigi programme could impose a substantial annual cost on public finances through tax incentives granted to participating projects.

For protesters such as Sahores, the central issue remains the protection of land and water for future generations.

The argument has increasingly moved beyond individual property disputes to a broader question about sovereignty. Activists fear that if foreign investors gain greater control over large territories containing rivers, lakes, forests, minerals and energy resources, local communities could have less influence over decisions affecting their daily lives.

Milei’s supporters see foreign investment as an opportunity to unlock Argentina’s enormous economic potential. His opponents fear that the same process could deepen inequality, weaken environmental protections and accelerate the displacement of Indigenous people.

The conflict is therefore unlikely to disappear soon. With legal challenges, legislative battles and protests continuing, Argentina is confronting a fundamental question about what kind of development it wants.

For the government, opening the country to international capital is central to its economic transformation. For environmental activists and Indigenous communities, however, the land represents something that cannot be reduced to an investment opportunity.

As Sahores and other protesters continue to take their campaign to the streets and the courts, their message is becoming increasingly clear: economic growth, they argue, should not come at the cost of public access to water, environmental protection, Indigenous rights and national control over strategic resources.