"Deadly Algal Bloom Triggers Social Uprising in Southern Chile"

"SANTIAGO - A ban on harvesting shellfish in Chiloé due to a severe red tide outbreak sparked a social uprising that has partially isolated thousands of local residents of the southern Chilean archipelago and revived criticism of an export model that condemns small-scale fishing communities to poverty and marginalisation.

“I was born and raised on this island,” said Carlos Villarroel, the president of the Mar Adentro union of artisanal fishers in the municipality of Ancud, 1,100 km south of Santiago. “I am the son and grandson of artisanal fishermen. My father, who is now 70, taught me and my brother to work out at sea. None of us ever suffered before when there was a red tide,” he told IPS by phone.

But Villarroel and another 5,000 fishers in the southern Chilean region of Los Lagos are affected today by the red tide, a phenomenon caused when microscopic algae reproduce and cluster in one area of the ocean."

Orlando Milesi and Marianela Jarroud report for Inter Press Service May 11, 2016.