Brazil information about country

Crist. Rio de Janeiro, Brazil См. Фото-галерею

Brazil is the country of South America with nearly half of the continent's area and people; worldwide it ranks fifth in both area and population, which is as diverse as it is large. About 54 percent (103 million) are mainly of European origin, descendants of immigrants from Portugal, Italy, Spain, Germany and Eastern Europe. More than 44 percent (85 million) are black or of mixed-race, a legacy of the African slave trade. Less than 1 percent (700,000) are from indigenous groups, mostly Indians in the Amazon region; smaller numbers of Japanese, other Asians, and Arabs live in the larger Brazilian cities.

The motto "Ordem e Progresso"—(Order and Progress)—appears on Brazil's flag. Political progress continues after years of military dictatorship gave way to civilian rule in 1985. Recent censuses reveal social progress, with lower infant mortality rates and higher literacy rates. Brazil's growing urbanization rate helps economic development(some 80 percent of Brazilians live in urban areas), but creates serious social and environmental problems in cities.

São Paulo, with some 10.9 million people, is Brazil's largest city—and one of the world's largest metropolises. It is the leading industrial producer and financial center, but problems with pollution, overcrowding, and poverty abound. The Southeast region of Brazil includes São Paulo, Belo Horizonte, and Rio de Janeiro—the economic hub of Brazil, containing more than 40 percent of the country's population. South of São Paulo is a rich agricultural region with European-style standards of living, where German and Italian are still spoken alongside Portuguese. Itaipu, the second largest hydroelectric power facility in the world, provides electricity to power-hungry São Paulo.

Brazil's second most populous region is the Northeast region, from Maranhao in the north down to Bahia (the most African of Brazilian states). The architecture of cities like Recife and Salvador (Portuguese colonial capital, 1549-1763) shows an earlier age of plantation wealth, but today this is a poor region subject to devastating droughts. Millions have left here for jobs in the Southeast. However, tourism has begun to boom due to sunny weather, samba music, and soft sand beaches.

The North, dominated by the Amazon, is the largest region with the fewest people. The government is making progress in conserving the tropical rain forest and protecting the indigenous people. Tumucumaque National Park, created in 2002, is the world's largest tropical forest park.

Geography

Brazil covers nearly half of South America and is the continent's largest nation. It extends 2,965 mi (4,772 km) north-south, 2,691 mi (4,331 km) east-west, and borders every nation on the continent except Chile and Ecuador. Brazil may be divided into the Brazilian Highlands, or plateau, in the south and the Amazon River Basin in the north. Over a third of Brazil is drained by the Amazon and its more than 200 tributaries. The Amazon is navigable for ocean steamers to Iquitos, Peru, 2,300 mi (3,700 km) upstream. Southern Brazil is drained by the Plata system—the Paraguay, Uruguay, and Paraná rivers.

Government

Federal republic

Economy

Industry: textiles, shoes, chemicals, cement, lumber, iron ore.
Agriculture: coffee, soybeans, wheat, rice; beef.
Exports: transport equipment, iron ore, soybeans, footwear, coffee.

Health

The Family Health Extension Program provides medical attention to vulnerable groups, which do not have easy access to the hospital system. Studies link the 13 percent child mortality rate decrease between 1999 and 2004 to the expansion of the Program. Vaccination coverage and child nutrition has also improved under the program.

Brazil developed one of the most encompassing and efficient strategies in the world to slow the rate of HIV / Aids infection and to care for those already affected. The program has stabilized the advance of the epidemics through free distribution of drugs and focused educational and awareness campaigns.

Natural Resources

The World Bank supports a new generation of projects which focus on local and regional aptitudes for environmentally sustainable income generation. Pará Rural, for instance, will use already degraded areas for production, thus decreasing the pressure on the forest. The Amazon Protected Areas Program is well on its way to preserve biodiversity in 50 million hectares of the Amazon region by 2013. In partnership with the international community, the Pilot Program to Conserve the Brazilian Rain Forest has already demarcated over 45.5 million hectares of indigenous land, and sponsored more than 200 projects that experiment with new models of rain forest conservation.

Brazil is a country overflowing with music from every corner, and there is a deep connection between Brazilians and their music. A tricultural mix of indigenous groups, Portuguese colonizers and African slaves makes for an immensely diverse population. (It has the largest number of African descendants outside of Africa.) And while the indigenous music retained much of its traditional context throughout the colonial period (and even to today), it never played as central a role in the development of Brazil's popular music as did the music of the Africans and Portuguese.