Pirquinero

A charactistic of the pirquinero is that they are involved in a wide range of stages of the production including mineral prospecting, extraction and processing.

[7] More specifically pirquineros in Chile concentrate in the communes of Diego de Almagro, Andacollo, Vallenar, Copiapó, Tocopilla, Chañaral and Taltal.

[12][13] Small, high-grade, unexploited deposits such as narrow veins in abandoned mines are one of the main targets of pirquineros and scavanging waste rock dumps through pallaqueo in these sites is usually a secondary activity.

[9] Pallaqueo is the hand selection of ore fragments for processing which allows to increase the over-all grade of the processed ore.[14] A type of estimation of ore grade in use by pirquineros is called puruñar or cachear and consists of putting finely crushed rock in a bull's horn split in half and diluting it in water.

[19][20] From 1974 onwards the output of pirquineros have been drastically overshadowed by those of large mining companies formed by foreign investment that entered the country following the Decreto Ley 600.