In one other important article of food sup ply South America outranks all other parts of the world combined. This article is coffee. Brazil alone produces not merely more coffee than any other country, but actually more than all the rest of the world put together. In fact Brazil's output of coffee amounts to about three-fourths of the world's supply, while sev eral other of the Latin-American countries pro duce considerable quantities of this important world crop. The total world output of coffee averages about 2,500,000,000 pounds per and of this Brazil produces three-fourths and Latin America as a whole produces four-fifths. And when we remember that the coffee crop of the world amounts to about $350,000,000 per annum in value in the countries of production we begin to realize the value of Latin America's production of this article of commerce. The cacao crop of the world amounts in value to about $100,000,000 per annum, and Latin America produces about one-half of this, di vided between Ecuador, Brazil and the West Indian Islands, the Ecuador crop amounting to about 100,000,000 pounds a year, and that of Brazil about 75,000,000. Of flaxseed, or lin seed, as it is usually termed in commerce, Argentina produces about one-third of the world's supply, the total world crop usually amounting to about 130,000,000 bushels, while Argentina alone produced 44,000,000 bushels in 1913, though the crop of 1916 was very small owing to the extreme droughts which adversely affected many of the agricultural products of that country.
Wool, hides, rubber, tin and copper are Latin America's chief contribution to the manu facturing requirements of the world at the present time, and the output of copper on the western coast of continental Latin America has greatly increased in very recent years. The relative rank of the Argentine and Uruguay in the world's supply of wool and hides is in dicated by the figures above quoted of sheep and cattle in the same countries compared with those of other parts of the world, as above presented. In copper production Chile holds second rank as a world producer, and rapidly increasing its output through the great mines owned by American capital, though her out put is • small as compared with the United States, which still supplies over one-half of the copper of the world. Chili has also the world's chief supply of nitrate. Mexico and Peru are considerable producers of gold and silver.
Bolivia supplies about one-fifth of the World's tin, and has very large supplies yet undeveloped. In India rubber, Brazil formerly held first rank in world production prior to the recent wonderful development in the production of plantation rubber, but her output of forest rubber is declining by reason of the enormous supplies of plantation rubber now entering the world markets. Of cotton considerable quan tities are grown in Brazil, Peru, Chile, Mexico, Colombia and the northern part of Argentina. Tobacco is grown in great quantities, that of Cuba alone amounting to about $25,000,000 a • year.
Latin America has a more promising future than any of the other great undeveloped areas of the world. It is, as already shown, a large producer of many classes of foodstuffs and manufacturing material for which the world is clamoring, its fertile area is larger in propor tion to its entire extent than that of any other of the undeveloped continents, and the present population per square mile is smaller than that of any other of the continents except Aus tralia which has a much larger percentage of desert than has Latin America. The greatest lack in natural supplies is in coal, of which she has but small quantities, found chiefly In Chile, but the recent developments in fuel oil production in Mexico and the mountain re gions of the west coast of South America, coupled with the increasing use of the splendid water powers for the production of electricity, promise to minimize the disadvantage due to this lack of fuel supplies.
Latin America's greatest requirement at the present time is capital for transportation facili ties and for the development of the great agri cultural and mineral resources which will be come available with facilities to transport the natural products to the navigable streams of which South America has the world's greatest supply and thence to the ocean where steam ships are available to transport them to the waiting markets of the world. The lessons of the war have shown that the horseless vehicle and flying machine can now be successfully used over areas in which no modern roads exist, and the development of the motor for farm pur poses has shown how agriculture can now be conducted in the tropics without the aid of the horse. These things point to a great develop ment in the producing power of Latin America in the near future.