October 1, 2026 — Fishermen along Latin America’s Pacific coast are reeling in half-empty nets as ocean warming aggravated by El Niño causes tuna, anchovies and other top catches to migrate to cooler waters.
From Ecuador and Peru in South America to Panama and Guatemala in Central America, some skippers have stopped going out altogether as fish stocks dwindle close to shore, in seas running at up to 6 degrees Celsius above normal.
“The water is warm,” Juan Ollague, 56, told AFP in the southwestern Ecuadorian port of Santa Rosa, where hundreds of idle fishing boats are crammed into a small port.
After a night on the water, Ollague returns with just six small tuna.
“We came away empty-handed,” he lamented.
“Fishing used to be good; now it’s terrible,” fellow skipper Darwin Zambrano, 53, complained as he untangled a net that hasn’t scooped up big tuna like albacore or bonito in weeks.
El Niño is the warming phase of a natural cycle in the tropical Pacific that causes hotter and drier conditions in some places, and cooler and wetter conditions in others.