Latin American Economic Geography

Chapter 6Chapter 6

Modern latifundia

• Expansion of Cattle Ranching– Deforestation – Soil erosion

• From family ownership to corporate ownership

• Corporate plantations and commercial farms

• Sugarcane – Caribbean islands (began in Brazil)– From trapiches to ingenios to centrales

• Cuba & Dominican Republic (1500s to present)

• Henequen – Yucatan Peninsula (early 20th century)

• Coffee – Central America, Colombia, Brazil– Began in Costa Rica (Meseta Central) late 1800s – Small family farms in Costa Rica & Colombia (Antioquia)– Large estates in Guatemala, El Salvador, & Brazil

• Bananas – Caribbean Lowlands of Central America– United Fruit Co. of Boston – Began in Costa Rica at end of 1800s – All throughout Central America during early 1900s – Later also in Pacific coastal lowlands in C.R., Panama, & Ecuador

Globalization and Neoliberal trade policies – Structural Adjustment programs and Non-traditional Agriculture– Maximize export and generate foreign currency revenue– Multinational Corporations & large commercial farms– Ex. Augusto Pinochet in Chile

• Pineapples – Central America

• Melons – Central America

• Citrus fruits – Central America

• Grapes, cherries, peaches, nectarines – Chile – For northern hemisphere during winter (southern summer growing)

Land Use and Land Tenure in Latin America

• Minifundia– Traditional agriculture

• Slash-and-burn (roza y quema), shifting cultivation, swidden, milpa• Intensive farming – terraces, raised fields (chinampas), irrigation

– Traditional houses – adobe, bajareque, thatch

• Land Reform– Mexican Revolution of 1910

• Ejido– U.S. opposition – CIA “Operation Success” in Guatemala (1954)– Cuban Revolution 1959– Nicaraguan Revolution 1979

• Land colonization – Spontaneous – push factors: due to inequitable land tenure

• Expansion of latifundia (commercial farms, cattle ranching) • Leads to deforestation

– Directed – by government agency or program– Semi-directed – Mennonites in Mexico and Paraguay

Contemporary Cities and Urban

Geography in Latin America

Chapter 7Chapter 7