Drought in the Puna highlands
The great drought of 1956-1961 in the Puna altiplano caused massive migration to urban centers, especially Arequipa, where the Puna population in shantytowns increased significantly. This climatic phenomenon was combined with other droughts and floods during the 1950s and 1960s.
The "great drought" of 1956-1961 in the Puna highlands generated significant emigration to urban areas such as Arequipa. Between the mid-1950s and the mid-1960s, the percentage of Puno residents in the slums of Arequipa increased from 12.9% to 39.08%, reaching 41.41% in 1971. The population of the city of Puno grew between 1940 and 1961, from 15,999 to 24,459 inhabitants, while Juliaca experienced explosive growth from 7,002 to 20,351 inhabitants in the same period. Between the 1950s and 1960s there was a particularly strong combination of drought and flood periods, with the droughts of 1955-56, 1957 and 1964, and the floods of 1960, 1962 and 1963.