Japanese Peruvian
| Total population | |
|---|---|
|
3,949 Japanese nationals 160,000 Peruvians of Japanese descent (Including Peruvians in Japan) |
|
| Regions with significant populations | |
| Lima, Trujillo, Huancayo, Chiclayo | |
| Languages | |
| Spanish, Japanese | |
| Religion | |
| Predominantly Roman Catholicism, Buddhism, Shintoism |
|
| Related ethnic groups | |
| Chinese Peruvians, Japanese Americans, Japanese Canadians, Japanese Brazilians, Asian Latinos |
3,949 Japanese nationals
Japanese Peruvians (Spanish: peruano-japonés or nipo-peruano, Japanese: 日系ペルー人, Nikkei Perūjin) are Peruvian citizens of Japanese origin or ancestry.
The Japanese began arriving in Peru in the late 1800s. Many factors motivated the Japanese to immigrate to Peru.
At the end of the nineteenth century in Japan, the rumor spread that a country called Peru somewhere on the opposite side of the earth was "full of gold". This country, moreover, was a paradise with a mild climate, rich soil for farming, familiar dietary customs, and no epidemics, according to advertisements of Japanese emigration companies. (Konno and Fujisaki, 1894) 790 Japanese, all men between the ages of 20 and 45, left Japan in 1898 to work on Peru's coastal plantations as contract laborers. Their purpose was simple: to earn and save money for the return home upon termination of their four-year contracts. The 25 yen monthly salary on Peru's plantations was more than double the average salary in rural Japan (Suzuki, 1992).
At the time of the First Sino-Japanese War, the economic state of Japan was poor. Because of the poor economic conditions in Japan, a surplus of skilled farmers in Japan occurred. Peru provided a new job market that was accommodating to the Japanese farmers. When the Japanese first arrived in Peru, the Peruvians welcomed the hard-work ethic of the Japanese worker. They provided the Peruvians with a cheap and productive labor source. After the population of Japanese immigrants grew in Peru, many Peruvian Japanese began opening small businesses. Peru has the second largest ethnic Japanese population in South America (Brazil has the largest) and this community has made a significant cultural impact on the country today approximately 1.4% of the population of Peru.
Peru was the first Latin American country to establish diplomatic relations with Japan, in June 1873. Peru was also the first Latin American country to accept Japanese immigration. The Sakura Maru carried Japanese families from Yokohama to Peru and arrived on April 3, 1899 at the Peruvian port city of Callao. This group of 790 Japanese became the first of several waves of emigrants who made new lives for themselves in Peru, some nine years before emigration to Brazil began.
Most immigrants arrived from Okinawa, Gifu, Hiroshima, Kanagawa and Osaka prefectures. Many arrived as farmers or to work in the fields but, after their contracts were completed, settled in the cities. In the period before World War II, the Japanese community in Peru was largely run by issei immigrants born in Japan. "Those of the second generation [the nisei] were almost inevitably excluded from community decision-making."
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Wikipedia