Pedernales

People lived in the region in colonial times, but the town itself is young. It was founded in 1927, when the government of Horacio Vásquez set up an agricultural colony here, placed under the protection of the Virgin of Altagracia, as part of the municipality of Enriquillo. The writer Sócrates Nolasco was appointed its administrator, and most of the first colonists came from Duvergé; the first was Genaro Pérez Rocha, a prosperous rancher who later brought the first families to settle.

The name comes from pedernal, Spanish for flint, a yellowish quartz that strikes sparks and is found in the Pedernales River, which marks the southernmost part of the border between the Dominican Republic and Haiti. In 1937 a road linking the colony with Oviedo was built by 500 men working in brigades of ten, and in 1938 Pedernales became a municipal district. When Pedernales province was created in 1957, split from Barahona, the town became its capital. Bauxite was once mined in the area.

In recent decades the coast has become the focus of national plans for tourism. Bahía de las Águilas, the subject of a long dispute over its ownership, was declared public land and placed within a wide government development plan, and the authorities have said that no construction will take place in protected zones. In 2024 the government chose to build a new international airport in the province rather than enlarge the airfield at Cabo Rojo.

Pedernales lives on the frontier. Across the river lies the Haitian town of Anse-à-Pitres, and the crossing between them is one of the four main land crossings between the two countries. The town's market lies by the river, facing the market of Anse-à-Pitres, and the border area has a heavy military presence and checkpoints. Anse-à-Pitres is a commune in Haiti's Sud-Est department, and Pedernales is twinned with Villagonzalo Pedernales in Spain.

Local cultural life is small and community-run. The town has a folkloric dance group, a baton ballet and a music band, and palos y atabales, the Dominican sacred drum music played at religious ceremonies on saints' days, are part of local tradition. Cockfighting is a popular pastime.

The landscape shapes local identity. Pedernales sits between two national parks — Jaragua along the coast and the Sierra de Bahoruco inland — which, with Lake Enriquillo and parts of the municipality, formed the country's first biosphere reserve.

At the November 2022 census the municipality of Pedernales had about 24,400 people, about 85 per cent of them in urban areas, and it holds roughly seven-tenths of the population of the whole province. It is a small town with a slow pace, where much of daily life happens around the central park and the streets near the border.

Beef cattle, farming, mining and fishing are the main activities. Cattle and goats graze the savanna of Sansón, sometimes half-wild, and the fishing boats work mainly around Beata Island, where lobster and conch are the important catches.

Tourism, mostly by Dominican visitors, has grown markedly because of the region's landscapes. Bahía de las Águilas and the Sierra de Bahoruco park are the main draws, and the government has development plans for the coast and has chosen to build a new international airport in the province. The town is a long drive from the rest of the country.

Food in Pedernales comes from the sea and the dry savanna. Lobster and conch, known in Spanish as lambí, are caught around Beata Island and eaten with fresh fish, tostones, twice-fried green plantain, and rice. Local fishermen also work from La Cueva on Cabo Rojo, where the boats leave for Bahía de las Águilas.

Goats and beef cattle graze the savanna of Sansón, so goat and beef are local meats. Everyday lunch follows the Dominican pattern of la bandera — rice, beans and stewed meat — and casabe, a flat cassava bread with Taíno roots, is served with soups and stews. Beans and coffee, the main crops, are both grown in the mountains of the municipality.

In the evenings small food stalls and eateries around the central park serve quick meals to people back from the beach. Strong, sweet coffee starts the day, and Presidente beer and rum are drunk in the colmados after dark.