Edgardo Barrueto

Barrueto managed the El Hualli San Luis farm near Cajón, Temuco, focusing on dairy and crops. He was a member of the Temuco Agricultural Development Society (SOFO) and the local Dairy Cooperative, and also belonged to the Society of Retired Law-Enforcement Officers, the Temuco Social Club, and several sports and charitable associations.

Barrueto began in local government as a councillor (regidor) for Temuco and later acting mayor.

In the 1949 election he won a seat as an independent Agrarian candidate (on the Progressive Liberal Party list) for the 21st Departmental Group (Temuco, Lautaro, Imperial, Pitrufquén and Villarrica) for 1949–1953, serving on the Permanent Commission of Agriculture and Colonization and the Special Commission on the Peasantry. He was re-elected for 1953–1957, remaining on Agriculture and Colonization.

In 1957 he joined the Agrarian Labor Party (PAL) and was elected senator for the 8th Provincial Group (Biobío, Malleco and Cautín) for 1957–1965. In the Senate he served on the Permanent Commissions of Public Works (first period) and of Mining (second period), as well as the Special Commission on Credit for Agricultural Mechanization, and was part of the PAL parliamentary committee (1958). He later left the PAL and, in 1962, joined the Liberal Party.

After leaving the Senate in 1965, President Eduardo Frei Montalva appointed him Chilean ambassador to Costa Rica, a post he held until 1967.

Barrueto died in Santiago on 12 October 2005, aged 98.

• BCN Profile