Fishing is a Big Piece of Peru’s Industry Economy

 Peru has a very diverse economy. Peru’s economy varies from mining, refining, and forestry-to clothing and energy. One of the biggest parts of Peru’s economy is fishing. Fishing is a big piece of Peru’s industry economy, and it has many different aspects to it. The economy of fishing is unpredictable and it can turn out bad.

Peru has a big catch of fish. In fact, Peru has the second most catches of fish in the world! The fish that Peru catches the most is anchovies. The reason Peru catches so many because they are attracted to the plant life that is in the Peruvian Current. Once they catch the anchovies, they either turn them into fish meal, or export them as animal feed. Peru currently has such a big economy, but how did Peru get it?

Peru’s economy for fishing started off in the 1950’s, and the industry rapidly grew. Soon, Peru became the biggest producer and exporter of fish meal. Peru’s fish industry was booming and doing great until the 1960’s. That was when overfishing seemed to be a problem, but people just ignored the signs and kept fishing as much as normal. Then, in 1970s, that was when overfishing became a BIG BIG problem. Fishermen could not ignore the signs now, because fishing was so popular that the anchovy resource became scarce!

Why is there such a great fishing resource in Peru? This is due to the freezing cold waters of the Peruvian Current. Peruvian fishermen fish in the Peruvian Current because the Peruvian Currents’ freezing cold water is extremely good for certain types of plant life-such as algae to grow. All of that plant life lures a lot of fish to go there, and that is why there is so many fish there.

Peru is very protective of their fishing area, they don’t want any other country interfering with their fishing industry. To protect their elite fishing area, they extended their fishing rights out to 200 nautical miles so foreign countries would not come in to their area. It worked for the most part, but then Argentina and the U.S came in. Ever since Argentina and the U.S came into their fishing area, Peru has occasionally fined or charged U.S fishing boats. This caused a big disagreement with both countries.

Peru’s fishing industry is very big, and normally does very well, but sometimes there are things that greatly affect it. One of the problems is overfishing. When the fishing industry fishes too much over a period of time, then a lot of the fishing resource will be reduced. Afterwards, it will be a lot harder to catch fish.

Overfishing is a big problem for the fishing industry, but most people will probably consider El Nino the biggest threat to Peru’s fishing. El Nino is the main factor that decides how good or bad the fishing industry will perform. When El Nino occurs, it replaces the normally freezing cold waters of the Peruvian Current to much warmer waters. The plant life that lives in the Peruvian Current needs the cold water of the Current to grow, but since it is much warmer now, a bunch of the plant life to die. After most of the plant life die, the fish have no food, so they leave the area to find different places with more food. Then, the fishermen come to fish and find that all the fish have left the Peruvian Current. Since most of the fish are gone, the fishermen don’t catch as many fish as normal, and then fishing industry does not even come close to their normal catch. For example, in 1972, when El Nino occured, the catch of fish was a quarter of it's normal size! El Nino is very deadly, and every year, Peru’s fishermen hope that it doesn’t occur.

One of the most deadly and devastating El Nino occurrences was in 1982-1983, and because of that occurrence, the fishing industry was devastated for a long time. After those devastating years where El Nino occurred, the fishing industry had to slowly build itself up. The fishing industry took a few years to recover and only fully recovered in the mid 1980s. Afterwards, the fishing industry inclined at a rapid pace, and reached catch rates that they had never reached before. Then in 1991, the government did a very big favor to the fishing economy by removing all of the restrictions and constraints on the producing and selling of fish products in Peru. This helped the fishing industry a lot by making it much easier to sell the fish that they catch.

Currently, the fishing industry is doing very well. A lot of Peru’s food is made up of fish meal, so the fishing industry is getting more demands for that. Overall, fishing is very important to Peru’s economy and Peru would not be the same if there wasn’t a fishing industry. The fishing industry is not only crucial to the economy, but it is also important to the food and many other things!