Looking at a map of the vast continent of South America, largely situated in the beautifully warm equatorial regions, distant from the Antarctic circle, one might surmise that this mass of land is a veritable paradise, especially if he or she has heard of the extensive network of rivers that vein the land and the generous rainfalls that characterize the torrid zone.

At least, this was my opinion of the continent before I moved here two and a half years ago. I asked myself, back in those days, how, with all the benefits of nature at their disposal, South Americans could lag so far economically and culturally.

The truth of the matter is that from the standpoint of agriculture, South America is not as great as a map makes it look. It takes more than warm air to create a thriving rural economy apparently. Now that I've travelled most of the continent, I see now naďve my views were. South America has a tremendous amount of wasteland, and by that, I mean land that cannot be farmed.

First of all, you have the awesome expanse of the Andes Mountains, much of which is destitute of or deficient in agriculture. It's not easy to cultivate mountains, though there are fertile valleys here and there.

One thing that I did not understand until I flew over it, is that the Brazilian jungle is not merely a hitherto untouched frontier that is on the verge of productive colonization. No, it's just one big incredible swamp, with as many rivers and rivulets as the human circulatory system has veins and arteries. In many places, the land is nothing but a jigsaw puzzle of tiny islands, completely surrounded by water. I wonder what, if anything, can be done with it all. The jungle extends also into Perú, Colombia, Venezuela and the Guianas (Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana).

What shocked me most of all, though, was that Patagonia, which is roughly the southern half of Argentina is just an utterly barren, empty wasteland. Also there is abject sandy desert in Chile and Perú, along the Pacific, almost all the way from Santiago to Tumbes, over 2000 miles.

The fertile part of Argentina, the Pampas, in central and northern Argentina is one of the more fruitful regions of South America, and farming there is very productive. The other fertile area of South America is eastern Brazil, which is sunny, rainy but not too rainy, and flat, with rich soil. There are scattered tracts of good land in the other countries too of course., but never enough.

Wondering just how much arable land there is in south America, this morning I got the figures from the CIA World Factbook. Argentina is the only country where arable land exceeds 8% of total land, whereas the U. S. has 19% arable land. Below is a table listing the 13 countries of South America, each with its area in square kilometers, a multiplier equal to the decimal equivalent of the percentage of arable land, and the product, which is the total arable land in the country in square kilometers.

Adding up the figures for the 13 countries, I get a South American total, which I compare with the corresponding figures for the United States. From this comparison, we see that, though the area of the United States is only 54% of South America's, arable land in the U. S. amounts to 162% of South America's.

This may help explain South America's sluggish economy. There are other factors too, though, chief among which, in my opinion, is the ethnic makeup of the continent, but I'll leave that sensitive subject for another day.

Argentina...2,766,890 x .1231 = 340,604
Bolivia...1,098,580 x .0267 = 29,332
Brazil...8,511,965 x .0696 = 592,433
Chile...756,950 x .0265 = 20,059
Colombia...1,138,910 x .0242 = 27,562
Ecuador...283,560 x .0585 = 16,589
French Guiana...91,000 x .0011 = 100
Guyana...214,970 x .0244 = 5,245
Paraguay...406,570 x .0760 = 30,899
Peru...1,285,220 x .0289 = 37,143
Suriname...163,270 x .0037 = 604
Uruguay...176,220 x .0743 = 13,093
Venezuela...912,050 x .0295 = 26,905

South America (total)...17,806,155 x .0641 = 1,140,568
United States…9,631,418 x .1913 = 1,842,490

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