World Geography

Latin America

• The distance from the border between the United States & Mexico reaches down to Tierra del Fuego at the southern-most tip of South America, a distance of about 7,000 miles.
• The Andes Mountains of the South American continent are part of a chain of mountain ranges that run through the western portion of North, Central, and South America. This range is called the Rockies in the United States, the Sierra Madre in Mexico, and the Andes in South America. It acts as a natural barrier and home to some of the most important civilizations in the hemisphere, including the Inca in Peru.
• Highlands are made up of the mountainous or hilly sections of a country. The highlands of Latin America include parts of Venezuela, Guyana, Suriname, French Guiana, and Brazil.
• South America has wide plains that have rich soil for growing crops and plenty of grasslands for grazing livestocks.
• Llanos, cerrados, and pampas are all used for farming or grazing livestocks.
• South America has three major river systems, the Orinoco River (which is mainly in Venezuela), the Amazon River (the 2nd longest river in the world), and the Parana River (traveling 3,000 miles, originating from southern Brazil).
• The Caribbean Islands is made up of three major groups: Greater Antilles, Lesser Antilles, and the Bahamas.
• The Greater Antilles: Cuba, Jamaica, Hispaniola, and Puerto Rico. The island of Hispaniola is divided between the countries of Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
• The Lesser Antilles: smaller islands southeast of Puerto Rico, divided into the Windward Islands and the Leeward Islands.
• Latin America has a large supply of natural resources such as gold, silver, iron, copper, bauxite (aluminum ore), tin, lead, and nickel. Plus, there are mines throughout the region and produce precious gems, titanium, and tungsten.
• South America is one of the world's leaders in the mining of raw materials. Many of these resources are exported to other parts of the world.
• Oil, coal, natural gas, uranium, and hydroelectric power are all plentiful in Latin America.
• Venezuela and Mexico have major oil reserves, and Brazil is rich in hydroelectric power because of its many rivers and waterfalls. It's also rich in oil and gas.
• Latin America has a very varied climate and vegetation: tropical climate zones with rain forests, dry climate zones, and mid-latitude climate zones.
• To clear fields, Native peoples use the slash-and-burn technique, where they cut down trees, brushes, and shrubs and burning the ashes. Then they use the cleared field to grow crops. This technique receives limited success.
• Another technique related to farming is terraced farming. This is an ancient technique for growing crops on mountain slopes and hillsides, cutting step-like, horizontal fields in the the sides to prevent erosion.
• Cities are rapidly growing in Latin America.
• Tourism is increasing. It helps business in hotels, restaurants, boutiques, and other businesses. The disadvantages are pollution, and heavy traffic, not to mention large debts that are created by borrowing money in order to build tourist facilities.