Marcona District is one of five

districts A district is a type of administrative division that in some countries is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or counties, several municipalities, subdivisions ...

of the province

Nazca Nazca (; sometimes spelled Nasca; possibly from ) is a city and system of valleys on the southern coast of Peru. The city of Nazca is the largest in the Nazca Province. The name is derived from the Nazca culture, which flourished in the area be ...

in Peru. The district capital is

San Juan de Marcona San Juan de Marcona is the capital of the Marcona District of Nazca Province, Ica Region, Peru. It is a mining, commercial, port, and fishing town, with a population of approximately 20,000 inhabitants. Known as the iron capital and cradle of the H ...

a port on the Pacific coast.

Marcona Mine

The major industry in the Marcona District is the Marcona Mine, an

open-pit Open-pit mining, also known as open-cast or open-cut mining and in larger contexts mega-mining, is a surface mining technique that extracts rock (geology), rock or minerals from the earth. Open-pit mines are used when deposits of commercially ...

iron mine. The mine was acquired in 1992 by

Shougang Corporation Shougang Group Co., Ltd. ( zh, s=首钢集团有限公司), formerly known as Shougang Corporation, is a major state-owned enterprise based in Beijing, China. Founded in 1919, it is one of China's oldest and most prominent steel producers. Over ...

a state owned Chinese corporation which does business locally as Shougang Hierro Peru.

Economy and history

In addition to mining, there is trade and commercial fishing. In 1870, the Italian-born

Peruvian Peruvians (''/peruanas'') are the citizens of Peru. What is now Peru has been inhabited for several millennia by cultures such as the Caral before the Spanish conquest in the 16th century. Peruvian population decreased from an estimated 5–9 ...

geographer Antonio Raimnondi found the iron ore reserves. The first explorations of the zone in terms of ores and minerals were started in 1915. Marcona District is the only area in

Peru Peru, officially the Republic of Peru, is a country in western South America. It is bordered in the north by Ecuador and Colombia, in the east by Brazil, in the southeast by Bolivia, in the south by Chile, and in the south and west by the Pac ...

that mines iron ore and produces iron. The capital of the district

is located in

Ica Region Ica (; ) is a department and region of Peru. It borders the Pacific Ocean on the west; the Lima Region on the north; the Huancavelica and Ayacucho regions on the east; and the Arequipa Region on the south. Its capital is the city of Ica. Ge ...

Nazca Province Nazca is one of five provinces of the Ica Region of Peru. The capital of the province is the city of Nazca. Political division The province of Nazca is divided into five districts (, singular: ), each of which is headed by a mayor (''alcalde'' ...

. The exploitations of iron ore begun in 1953 in the bay of San Juan, in parts by the United States company Marcona Mining Company.

References

External links

Municipal web site
Districts of the Department of Ica Districts of the Nazca province 1955 establishments in Peru States and territories established in 1955 {{Ica-geo-stub