GUAJIRA, LA

departamento, northern Colombia. It is bounded on the north and west by the Caribbean Sea and on the east by Venezuela. Its 8,049-square-mile (20,848-square-kilometre) area stretches northward from the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta onto the semiarid La Guajira Peninsula (Venezuela, La Goajira), which it shares with Venezuela. The territory has little rainfall, owing to prevailing easterly winds and the lack of mountains. La Guajira was raised from the status of a commissariat to that of a territory in 1911 and was made a departamento in 1965. The raising of sheep and goats is widespread in the north; in the south, cotton, rice, and livestock are the principal products. The departamento also produces salt and coal, the latter from the El Cerrejon field, which contains one-third of Colombia's total coal reserves. Approximately one-fourth of La Guajira's inhabitants are Indians. Rohacha (q.v.), the departamento's capital, is linked to Santa Marta, Valledupar, and Maracaibo, Venezuela, by highway. Pop. (1985) 255,310.