AGRICULTURE
The agricultural sector (agriculture, cattle raising, forestry and he/she fishes) it embraces 27% of the GDP in the 2000. Inside this percentage, the agriculture is around 60%, the cattle raising contributes 30% and the forest exploitations, the hunt and the fishing, 10 remaining%. The agricultural activity concentrates mainly on The Countryside, region also well-known as The Field or The Interior, names with those that are denominated mainly the rural areas, that is to say, the whole country except for Asunción's metropolitan area and the big cities. Also in the central region, around the capital; in the Southwest, in the fork of the Paraná with the Paraguay; in the cord of Pirayú, and in the region traveled by the railroad that he/she goes from Villarrica to Incarnation. The Chaco hardly has agricultural production, being its main economic activity the cattleman.
The most important productions in 2000 were those of soya (1.044.054 have; 2.799.757 t), corn (384.762 have; 1.000.381 t), cotton (194.760 have; 244.477 t), wheat (127.680 have; 231.119 t), manioc (249.725 have; 3.744.626 t) and poroto (69.775 have; 55.820 t). Other outstanding items would be the cane of sugar, peanut, tobacco, strawberry, potato, tomato, watermelon, locote, banana, pineapple, orange and dull herb.
The soya is cultivated mainly in the oriental departments of the High Paraná and Itapúa, and its production allows Paraguay to be one of the first exporters of the world. The cotton is given envelope in everything in the departments of Caaguazú and San Pedro, and it constitutes, next to the soya, the main source of external revenues of the country. The corn has as main cultivation areas to the departments of High Paraná, Itapúa and Caaguazú. Lastly, the poroto and the manioc are also given in Caaguazú.
An important aspect to stand out is the character minifundista of the exploitations. According to the National Agricultural Census of the year 1991, 83,2% of the exploitations doesn't surpass the 20 there is. The cultivation of soya and wheat is carried out at managerial level, while the cotton is cultivated mainly by the small peasant in the areas minifundarias. Starting from the years ninety, the adverse climatic conditions and the fall of the international prices have produced a crisis especially in the sector that has experienced negative rates of growth, in the cotton.
The art. 148 of the Constitution pick up expressly that the agrarian reformation is one of the fundamental factors to achieve the rural well-being. She consists on the effective incorporation from the rural population to the economic and social development of the Nation. Equal systems of distribution, property and holding of the earth will be adopted; they will be organized the credit and the technical, educational and sanitary attendance; the creation will be fomented of cooperative agricultural and of other similar associations, and it will be promoted the production, the industrialization and the rationalization of the market for the integral development of the agriculture."
As much the agrarian statute as the creative law of the Institute of Rural Well-being are pending of revision for the Parliament. The new cultivated surfaces and the modernization of the production techniques (mechanization and use of fertilizers), they have favored the increment of the agrarian production. In 1991, the Paraguayan park of tractors reached the 15.878.
Source: www.enciclonet.com (© Micronet)
Encarta Enciclopedy 99 (© Microsoft)
Translations and editing by: Thomas Otter
