In our wider region, it is difficult to find a place where the once-magical promise of industrialisation and progress has turned so painfully into its opposite. What once brought livelihood with enthusiasm later proved to be poison. A single fibre is enough for a person to fall ill. Asbestos has taken many lives and, decades after its ban, continues to do so.

However, the tragic story of Anhovo does not end with the production of asbestos cement. In the 1990s, it was replaced by the production of styrene, which is also carcinogenic. This was soon followed by the co-incineration of toxic waste, massive extraction of raw materials from a local quarry, and an unregulated water supply system, into which recently leaked water contaminated with heavy metals.

Yet Anhovo is not only a story of environmental destruction and the dominance of capital over human health. It is also a story of resistance, courage, resilience, solidarity, and persistence.

We would like to thank the EKO Anhovo and Soča Valley Association, Bogomir and Slavka Bavdaž, Helena Markič, Dr. Metoda Dodič Fikfak, Milovan Berto, Lilijana Pulec, Branko Skok, Dr. Nevenka Mlinar, Dr. Nada Merljak, Zlatko Kumar, Anja Medved, Sabina Maver, Mojca Dumančič, and all those who shared their stories with us.

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