Artisanal divers from Sechura recover from the impacts of Cyclone Yaku

Doris Vice Ruiz has been an artisanal diver since she was 17 years old. She is one of the few women who are part of the productive chain of the fan shells in the province of Sechura, in Piura, north of Peru. Like most families in the bay, Vice Ruiz’s is completely dedicated to the mariculture of this resource. His mother sells professional equipment for artisanal divers, while his father is part of the Association of Artisanal Fishermen and Successful Shellfish Extractors of Sechura.

Despite how dangerous artisanal diving can be—especially if it is done informally—and how complicated and expensive it is to obtain permits to extract fan shells, Doris Vice Ruiz assures that Mariculture of this resource continues to be the most profitable economic activity in the province. After Cyclone Yaku in 2023, however, the outlook became discouraging for seafood farmers.

“After the pandemic we wanted to resume the activity that was paralyzed, but there was a massive mortality of the fan shells due to Cyclone Yaku and all production disappeared. Many lost and that again forced us to stop the activity,” says Vice Ruiz.

According to José Aldana, aquaculture specialist and spokesperson for the Sechura Bay Maritime Farmers Council, in 2021, 121 million dollars in fan shells were exported, but in 2023, after the passage of Yaku, this figure was reduced to almost half: 62 million dollars.

Given the situation, some mariculture families decided to migrate to other economic activities. Those who stayed chose to repopulate some areas of the bay with fan shells and begin a formalization process to, among other things, reduce the decompression risks to which they are exposed.

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Repopulating fan shells

Peru is the third largest exporter of fan shells in the world and the province of Sechura, in the Piura region, concentrates more than 80% of the national production of this mollusk. Spain, France and the United States are the main destinations.

Before the cyclone, “we were already coming from the La Niña phenomenon that inhibits the reproduction of fan shells,” says Aldana. To address this problem, mariculture farmers planted fan shell seeds, although prices had doubled. “The product was planted even though it was expensive and Cyclone Yaku arrived, devastating everything,” says Aldana.

In order to counteract the crisis generated in this extractive activity after the climate phenomena, the Ministry of Production authorized, in July 2023, the transfer of S/ 49.5 million (about 13 million dollars) in favor of the Development Fund of Microenterprise (Fondemi), to promote the economic reactivation of the production of fan shells. However, not all seafood farmers or artisanal divers have yet accessed this credit.

The repopulation process, says Doris Vice Ruiz, is done every time the resource is depleted and consists of “divers growing the seed brought from laboratories again. The shells are bought, carried in cylinders, always at dawn, and thrown into the area of ​​the sea that has been authorized. Then they have to be done weekly tasks because the snail or crab may prey on it. We have to go up to 12 meters deep one to two times a week to monitor,” he explains.

The cultivation of fan shells depends on the seeds that can be obtained from production in laboratories and from collection at sea. Currently, there are only private laboratories that sell fan shell seeds to large companies, so micro and small entrepreneurs must extract them from the depths of the sea, through artisanal divers.

For this reason, representatives of the Federation of Artisanal Fishermen of the Amypes Productive Category (Micro and Small Business Aquaculture) of Sechura Bay presented to the Regional Government of Piura a project for the installation of a shell seed production center. fan The objective is for this production center to annually provide mariculture farmers with 50 thousand bundles of seeds, each of which has 96 fan shells.

“In 2024, few planted due to fear of the El Niño phenomenon that was announced for the end of the year. That is the production that is beginning to go out this year for the foreign market,” says Aldana. Even so, “this year we believe that we will reach 40% production compared to 2021,” he maintains.

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A formalization process underway

Since he was 14, Marcos Marino Morales puts on his diving suit, mask and snorkel to explore the depths of the Sechura Sea. Today, five decades later, he remembers that he learned to dive in Constante Cove when some professional divers arrived from Lima and rented his father’s boat to sail in Sechura.

“40 years ago, the sea was a wonder, it was a new world. I learned because my dad had a boat that he rented to divers and I loved it. Then we became mariculture farmers when the cultivation of fan shells began,” he says.

Marino Morales is one of the 1100 artisanal divers which, approximately, are dedicated to the cultivation and extraction of fan shells in Sechura Bay. He has dedicated his entire life to working under the sea and, although he dives less than a few years ago, he assures that artisanal diving is an activity that is still profitable and exciting for him. “Our whole life has been linked to the sea. When you go fishing you want to continue exploring and it fascinates you,” he says. The problem, he acknowledges, is that “artisanal diving of fan shells has a very high risk and, given this, we are unfortunately unprotected.”

Artisanal divers can reach 12 meters deep under the sea to collect fan shells. Sometimes they must stay under water for up to two hours and can suffer decompression due to lack of oxygen. This occurs when, upon rising very quickly towards the surface, the atmospheric pressure is suddenly reduced, potentially blocking an artery and causing, for example, a heart attack.

“If you are in the informal sector and you feel decompression, that’s it because there is no one to help you. You go directly to the group of the deceased,” says Marino. In fact, it is estimated that every year about 12 people die in Sechura for this reason, says Aldana.

According to the Directorate of the Navy Captaincy (Dicapi), to carry out this work in the authorized areas of the sea, Artisanal divers must fully know the current fishing and health regulations that establishes the minimum catch sizes, restrictions, closed periods, prohibitions and sanctions for violating the rule.

However, the vast majority of artisanal divers dedicated to the extraction of fan shells operate informally. For this reason, there is still no official record that records the number of people who are in charge of carrying out this work and who are authorized by Dicapi to carry out the extraction of fan shells.

Continuing in informality not only prevents divers from forming legal organizations or associations and protecting their labor and health rights, it also prevents their work from being monitored to avoid misuse of marine resources.

As part of the solution to the problem of informality, the Social Fund of the Bayóvar Comprehensive Project (Fospibay)—a non-profit civil association, made up of the Provincial Municipality of Sechura, the Ministry of Energy and Mines, the San Martín peasant community de Sechura and the private sector— In 2024, they began a process of formalizing artisanal divers.

A first group of 200 divers has already approved the formalization process and it is expected that another 550 divers will also be formalized in December of this year, according to Fospibay management.

The formalization process includes training to reinforce certain knowledge, such as knowing how to regulate underwater times to avoid decompression.

The Navy Captaincy Directorate requires as a condition for granting the diver’s license in the artisanal category, not only that they know the time they can spend under the sea according to the decompression tables, but also that they know the location of the medical centers that They have a hyperbaric chamber in case they suffer from this problem.

However, although the Sechura Health Center is the closest to the bay and has a hyperbaric chamber to attend to these emergency cases, according to the divers and Fospibay, it is inoperative. “If the problem occurs, they have to go to Talara—which is three hours away from Sechura—where there is a hyperbaric chamber that belongs to the private sector,” says Aldana.

Although the work is arduous and dangerous, artisanal divers will continue in the field hoping that formalization will soon be an objective achieved for everyone.