A View of Developing Countries

Meaning of Third World
•
Practical definition – poor developing countries
•
Has lost some meaning
–
1 st World – Rich, non-communist market economies
–
2 nd World – Communist countries (they have practically disappeared)
–
3 rd World – non-communist poor countries with “immature” economies

A More Realistic Approach
•
Developed Countries (formerly 1 st World)
•
Developing Countries (all the other countries)
•
What about the former 2 nd World?
–
They are divided between the two groups – i.e. the Czech Rep. is in the developed group, whereas Vietnam is in the developing group.

Latin America

300-900 AD
The Roman Empire was already declining.

Mezoamerican Art

1st step in milpa agriculture - clearing

2nd step -- burning

Ashes serve as fertilizer

Will produce a decent harvest for several years only.

Typical rural town or village market.

Some are descended from the Maya
About 50 percent of Guatemala's 11 million people are
Indians, who speak 24 indigenous languages.

1% of the population owns 80% of the land .
20% of “white” men own cars; only 5% of Indian men do.

Copal, resin collected from pine trees in the surrounding mountains, is burned in the Roman
Catholic church.
99 percent of the population owns 20 percent of the land.

Belize

Spanish cultural influence architecture

Comparative Values
1 Pepsi = 1 peso OR 1 peso = 20 kg. of corn for a family for a week .

The Cathedral in Mexico City is the largest in Latin
America. It took 300 years to build. The Zocalo (plaza) in front of it is the largest in the world.

l Deforestation results from high prices paid for tropical hardwoods.

Lumberjacks averaged $10-15 per week; food for a family of six cost $6.

In the 19 th century the Yucatan was an informal colony of Chicago’s International Harvester, which turned the sisal into bailer twine for Midwestern farmers. The planters built wedding-cake mansions in Merida and sent their children to schools in New
Orleans and Havana .

Sisal Plants

Sisal cut & bundled for shipping

Sisal fibers drying

Loading primary products for export

Rainfall variations in
Central
America

Checking coffee beans

Fields of cash crops for export

Raw latex?

Exposing poor, red lateritic soil

Tourism does little for the poor.

West Africa

350 years of slave trade here -- 9.5 million slaves
Dutch Fort 1637
Portuguese Fort 1482

South Asia

Galle, Sri Lanka
Portuguese 1580-1640
Dutch 1640-1796
British 1796-1948
Independence 1948

Tea is grown in the Hill Country, above 1,220 meters
.

British colonials brought the Tamil Hindu (from India) minority to pick tea.

The British established coffee (until 1870s), and later, tea plantations ; in
1948 the socialist government nationalized most of these private estates.

3 billion people in the world depend on rice for their food!

Sinhalese Buddhist are the majority in Sri Lanka.

What food is being sold at this roadside shop?

The bounty of the tropics. Why would people being hungry?

Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka's first capital in the 4th century BC.

A Buddhist statute

People climb up the 200-meter precarious metal steps to see the temple dancers painted in the caves 1,500 years ago.
The rock fortress of Sigiriya , the
Lion Rock was built by King
Kashyapa, in the last quarter of the
5th Century to fend off the persistent South Indian invaders.

And you think studying is hard work?