An interesting delve into history and how decisions made in the long past still influence national affairs today.
From the article
What is guano used for?
Guano is filled with nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorous. This makes it a wonderful fertiliser for our crops. In fact, we’ve been using guano in agriculture for more than 1,500 years. It was particularly treasured by the Inca Empire. This realm once stretched more than 4,000 kilometres from Ecuador to Chile, reaching from the Pacific Ocean across the Andes Mountains. Soil in parts of this vast territory was nutrient poor, but using bird guano as a fertiliser helped the empire to thrive, providing food security to more than eight million people. This valuable resource was produced by enormous colonies of seabirds, including Peruvian pelicans, guanay cormorants and Peruvian boobies, that lived on western South America’s coasts and islands. Their poo was so important to the Inca people that anyone who disturbed the seabirds faced the death penalty. In fact, these may be some of the earliest conservation laws.
The secret of guano’s fertilising power first spread to Europe in the mid-1500s, following Spain’s arrival and colonisation of South America. Guano’s popularity peaked in the nineteenth century – often called The Guano Age – and continued into the twentieth century. While extraction initially centred on Peru, it eventually spread, in particular to Namibia and several Pacific islands. Hundreds of thousands of tonnes of guano was shipped to the northern hemisphere. But guano ended up at the centre of several conflicts. Several countries, including Britain, shored up their guano supply by claiming land far from home. The Guano Islands Act, for example, is why the USA has so many territories in the Pacific today – the legislation was created to allow the annexation of uninhabited islands filled with guano. Peru, Chile, Bolivia and Spain went to war over guano-producing land, borders and taxes.
Guano mining was strenuous manual work. Labourers were often enslaved people, convicts and those otherwise coerced into working the guano fields. Atrocious conditions sometimes led to deadly rebellions. Bird poo also helped to fuel the First World War thanks to its use as an ingredient in gunpowder. It was a lucrative trade to be in. Guano was a crucial part of Peru’s economy throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
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From the article
What is guano used for?
Guano is filled with nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorous. This makes it a wonderful fertiliser for our crops. In fact, we’ve been using guano in agriculture for more than 1,500 years. It was particularly treasured by the Inca Empire. This realm once stretched more than 4,000 kilometres from Ecuador to Chile, reaching from the Pacific Ocean across the Andes Mountains. Soil in parts of this vast territory was nutrient poor, but using bird guano as a fertiliser helped the empire to thrive, providing food security to more than eight million people. This valuable resource was produced by enormous colonies of seabirds, including Peruvian pelicans, guanay cormorants and Peruvian boobies, that lived on western South America’s coasts and islands. Their poo was so important to the Inca people that anyone who disturbed the seabirds faced the death penalty. In fact, these may be some of the earliest conservation laws.
The secret of guano’s fertilising power first spread to Europe in the mid-1500s, following Spain’s arrival and colonisation of South America. Guano’s popularity peaked in the nineteenth century – often called The Guano Age – and continued into the twentieth century. While extraction initially centred on Peru, it eventually spread, in particular to Namibia and several Pacific islands. Hundreds of thousands of tonnes of guano was shipped to the northern hemisphere. But guano ended up at the centre of several conflicts. Several countries, including Britain, shored up their guano supply by claiming land far from home. The Guano Islands Act, for example, is why the USA has so many territories in the Pacific today – the legislation was created to allow the annexation of uninhabited islands filled with guano. Peru, Chile, Bolivia and Spain went to war over guano-producing land, borders and taxes.
Guano mining was strenuous manual work. Labourers were often enslaved people, convicts and those otherwise coerced into working the guano fields. Atrocious conditions sometimes led to deadly rebellions. Bird poo also helped to fuel the First World War thanks to its use as an ingredient in gunpowder. It was a lucrative trade to be in. Guano was a crucial part of Peru’s economy throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
Guano mining: Our deadly obsession with bird poo
We’ve been using guano for more than 1,500 years, but our demand for it has had a devestating impact on the birds that produce it.
