South America

The direction of the maritime trade of South America has been greatly affected by the World War and the completion of the Panama Canal. Whereas in 1913 the total tonnage of the traffic between South America and Europe was about five times that between South America and the United States, it has now been reduced to about four times as much. Traffic is still much better balanced between the east coast of South America and Europe than between the east coast and the United States, many ships returning to the United States in ballast. The United States now has, however, more than half the traffic with the west coast. The total annual foreign trade of South America is still small (about three thousand million dollars) and half of it is carried on by Argentina alone. Not only do none of the South American countries produce any of the manufactured articles that are in volved in world trade, but they do not supply to any appreciable extent manufactured articles for home consumption. There is, as in all pioneer countries, a considerable amount of home manu facturing carried on—weaving, furniture making, and the like— and some manufacturing in the larger cities, but the total of the latter does not equal that of a fair-sized city in the United States.

As a result there are few large cities in South America, Buenos Aires with about 2,230,946 people and Rio de Janeiro with about 1,500,00o being the only ones of world importance.

Political Divisions and Population.

The original Spanish colonies revolted from Spain toward the end of the first quarter of the 19th century and formed themselves into ten independent republics, the boundaries of which were based on the limits of the original colonial divisions. Brazil separated from Portugal as an independent monarchy in 1822, but did not establish herself as a republic until 1889. Only three European colonies remain on the continent—British and French Guiana, and Surinam (Dutch Guiana). Many disputes were involved in the establishing of the international boundaries on account of the vague language of the Royal decrees which established the original colonial divisions and the hazy knowledge of the topography of the continent upon which they were based. These have gradually been settled until

only three of importance remain—the Peru-Ecuador dispute over the territory between the Amazon and Putumayo rivers, the Bolivia-Paraguay dispute, and the Tacna-Arica dispute.

Previous to the separation of the colonies from the mother country, the colonists, except for the negroes introduced into Brazil and the north coast colonies, were almost entirely Spanish and Portuguese. Since that time there has been little emigration from other European countries to the west and north coast coun tries except to Chile, where there has been a considerable immi gration of Germans. In fact there has been little immigration of any kind into the west countries and little into those of the north coast except for the introduction of coolies from India and the East Indies to British and Dutch Guiana, respectively. On the east coast, however, there has been a large immigration from Europe. The 1914 census of the Argentine Republic gave a for eign-born population of 929,863 Italians, 93,634 Russians, 82,970 Spaniards, 79,491 French and 26,995 Germans. Brazil had, ac cording to the census of 1920, a foreign-born population of 558,405 Italians, 433,575 Portuguese, 219,142 Spaniards and 52,870 Ger mans. The population of Uruguay is about 25% foreign-born, mostly Italians and Spaniards. Six of the South American repub lics have taken a census in this century—Uruguay (1908), Argen tina (1914), Brazil (1920), Venezuela (1926), Chile (1920 and 1930) and Colombia (1918 and 1928). British Guiana had a cen sus in 1921 and in 1931, French Guiana in 1926 and 1931, and Surinam in 1933. Estimates are : Argentine Republic (1934) 12, ; Bolivia (1932) 3,077,533; Brazil (1933) 43,323,660; Chile (1934) 4,446,617; Colombia 8,893,030; Ecuador (1933) 2,600,116; Paraguay (1932) 870,197; Peru (1927) 6,147,000; Uruguay (1934) 1,993,234; Venezuela (1932) 3,261,734; British Guiana (1933) 321,260; French Guiana (1934) 24,250; Surinam (1933) 161,008. The total was over 87,000,00o. (R. R. P.)