Migration History
The first Korean migrant to Peru is believed to have been Park Man-bok, who was invited to Peru to coach the women's national volleyball team in 1972. Under his tutelage, the team would go onto a variety of successes in the 1980s, culminating in the winning of a silver medal for their country at the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul.
However, few of Park's countrymen joined him in Peru; as late as 1985, there were only nine Korean families resident in the country, totalling 27 individuals. A large portion did not come directly from Korea, but had instead first settled in Bolivia, Paraguay, or Chile. The population began to increase in 1993, as the economic and social situation in Peru stabilised; during the 1990s, roughly two or three new Korean families arrived in Peru every month. However, after 1997, their population fell by nearly 56% from 1,774 to just 788 by 2005, largely due to outward migration to Mexico and Guatemala in 1998 and 1999; some of those who had arrived via Chile also returned there.
By 2011, Peru's Korean population had recovered slightly to 1,305. According to South Korean government statistics, 24 took up Peruvian nationality, 342 stayed in Peru as permanent residents, 30 were international students, and the remaining 909 had other kinds of visas.
Read more about this topic: Koreans In Peru
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“A man acquainted with history may, in some respect, be said to have lived from the beginning of the world, and to have been making continual additions to his stock of knowledge in every century.”
—David Hume (1711–1776)