Working in the World's Biggest Fishing Port: The Environment and Labor in Chimbote, Peru, 1955–73

A sleepy fishing village of 4,000 in 1940, by 1973, the port of Chimbote, Peru had grown to over 160,000 people and become the center of Peru's fishing industry, at that time the largest in the world.  The boom depended on the extraction and transformation of anchoveta (Engraulis ringens) into fishmeal, a high-protein hog and poultry feed additive, sold primarily in Europe and China.  In less than thirty years, Chimbote became enmeshed in the world capitalist system at a deadly cost to its people and ecosystem.  This immersion into the world market and the emergence of Chimbote as the world's largest fishing port had an immense impact on the city's aquatic, terrestrial, and atmospheric ecosystems: described as ecologically abundant and serene before its boom, the fishing industry and population growth transformed Chimbote into a 'tragic city', renowned for pollution and poverty, as well as a crumbling morality – the culture of Chimbote, one dominated by fishermen, was characterized by brothels and bars. 
This paper uses archival documents, newspaper articles, and oral histories to analyze the relationship between nature, capital, and labor by focusing on the role of the city's fishermen in transformation of Chimbote.  I analyze how the fishermen's self-identification and livelihood contributed to the degradation of Chimbote's environments.  The fishermen's livelihood depended upon the extraction of fish, effectively placing their survival over the health of the ecosystem.  The fishermen realized they were engaging in unsustainable practices, but felt compelled to do so given the labor laws that classified them as temporary laborers and piecemeal wage system that paid them per ton landed.  The culture of insecurity created by the fishing industry contributed to ecological collapse, leading to the virtual disappearance of the anchoveta from Peruvian waters in 1973, sending the city and nation into an economic tailspin.