Yondó is a town and

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having municipal corporation, corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality' ...

Antioquia Department Antioquia () is one of the 32 departments of Colombia, located in the central northwestern part of Colombia with a narrow section that borders the Caribbean Sea. Most of its territory is mountainous with some valleys, much of which is part o ...

Colombia Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country primarily located in South America with Insular region of Colombia, insular regions in North America. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Caribbean Sea to the north, Venezuel ...

. It is part of the

Magdalena Medio Antioquia Magdalena Medio Antioquia is a subregion in Antioquia Department, Colombia. The region comprises six municipalities. The region is determined by its location within the Middle Magdalena Valley which covers the central area of the Magdalena River ...

sub-region. The first settlers arrived around 10,000 BC; archaeological site. The town was founded in 1941 to lodge the, at that time, discovered Casabe oilfield's engineers and workers of Shell Colombia S.A.(SCSA) Subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell. The town became a municipality in 1979. It is a Magdalena river port, across a river from

Barrancabermeja Barrancabermeja () is a municipality and city in Colombia, located on the shore of the Magdalena River, in the western part of the department of Santander. It is home to the largest oil refinery in the country, under direct management of ECOP ...

, where

's oldest and largest oil refinery is located.

Statistics

*07° 00' 28" latitude North; 73° 54' 51" longitude West; 75 m a.s.l. altitude *Surface area 1,903 km²: **30.2% natural forests, mostly secondary **55.1% pastures **10.6% secondary growth *Annual rainfall 2,799 mm, no month below 100 mm; mean temperature year around 27.2 °C *Total population 12,562; ca. 50% urban in the town seat, 50% rural

History

Yondó was an oilfield's worker camp built by the

Royal Dutch Shell Shell plc is a British multinational oil and gas company, headquartered in London, England. Shell is a public limited company with a primary listing on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) and secondary listings on Euronext Amsterdam and the New ...

oil company in 1945 in order to house some 2,000 workers and engineers. It was built in the usual Royal Dutch manner for camps in remote locations: with large comfortable modern houses, plenty of potable water, electricity, air conditioning, theater, social club with many amenities including olimpic pool, basquetball court, 18 hole golf course, bowling alley, large soccer field sewage system, schools, small hospital with many specialists, bilingual school, a small refinery to supply gasoline to domestic vehicles, excellent well maintained roadways, landing strip for small planes, radio and telephone communications, etc. These were (and would be today) considered ''luxuries'' and attracted -as many

enclave An enclave is a territory that is entirely surrounded by the territory of only one other state or entity. An enclave can be an independent territory or part of a larger one. Enclaves may also exist within territorial waters. ''Enclave'' is so ...

developments in remote areas do- a large number of settlers in the periphery of the oil production facilities. The oil company had acquired rights for a 40 year exploitation of the oil fields, until 1985 but resigned in 1981 under pressure from

FARC The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia – People's Army (, FARC–EP or FARC) was a Marxist–Leninist guerrilla group involved in the continuing Colombian conflict starting in 1964. The FARC-EP was officially founded in 1966 from peasan ...

terrorist and invaders. The production facilities and camp installations were turned in to the government and were mostly ransacked and destroyed by thieves. This latter were destined to house bona fide and opportunist settlers and thus the new town was ''founded''.

Sister city

Yondó has

sister city A sister city or a twin town relationship is a form of legal or social agreement between two geographically and politically distinct localities for the purpose of promoting cultural and commercial ties. While there are early examples of inte ...

relations with: *

Berkeley, California Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Anglo-Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland, Cali ...

Notes

# The area is given as 1,881 km² by the Antioquia Department Planning Agency while the Colombian National Geographic Institute states it as 1,903 km². There are also minor differences in altitude, urban area, etc. # Amparo Murillo Posada, Maria Teresa Arcila Estrada, Manuel Alberto Espinal, Giovani Restrepo Orrego, Gloria Estella Bonilla. 1994. ''Un mundo que se mueve como el río. Historia regional del Magdalena Medio''. Instituto Colombiano de Antropología (ICANH), Bogotá.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Yondo Municipalities of Antioquia Department