Middle American Realm
Map Test
– Do you want 30 instead of 20 places?
– Noise
Questions?
Midterm Content and structure
Review
Middle America
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–
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–
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Colonial origins
Mainland/Rimland Framework
Economic geography of Mexico
Elevation and settlement in Central America
Tropical deforestation
Map Test I Grade Distribution
Frequency Distribution - Map Test 1
12
Average = 71.4% B10
Frequency
8
6
4
2
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
Mark out of 20
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
Midterm: Thursday 10 February
Introduction, Europe, Russia, & Middle America.
Multiple choice: 25 @ 2 = 50
Definitions:
¾ @ 10 = 30
Essay:
1/3@20 = 20
75 minutes: Examination book and Scantron
Need pen and pencil
Two rooms
Mesoamerica
Culture Hearths
– Maya Civilization – lowland tropics
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•
•
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3000 BP
Classic Period 200-900 AD (CE)
Honduras, Guatemala, Belize, Yucatan
Cotton exports, specialization
E.g. Chichén Itzá
– Aztec Civilization-Valley of Mexico ~ 6,000 feet AMSL
• Teotihuacán →Toltecs →Aztecs
• 1300 AD (CE)
• Valley Of Mexico, Tenochtitlán (>100,000)
– Mexico City
Colonial Spheres
Colonial Spheres
British Decolonization
1962 Jamaica
1963 Trinidad and Tobago
1966 Barbados
1973 Bahamas
1974 Grenada
1978 Dominica
1979 St. Lucia
1981 Belize (British Honduras)
1983 St. Kitts and Nevis (devolution?)
Mainland/Rimland Framework
Mainland
– Euro-Indian influence
– Greater isolation
– Hacienda prevailed
Rimland
– Euro-African influence
– High accessibility
– Plantation economy
Mainland – Rimland Distinction
Agricultural Institutions
Plantation
Hacienda
•Production for export
•Monoculture-cash crop
•Seasonal employment
•Foreign ownership
•Market vulnerability
Ejido
•Feudal origins
•Domestic market
•Diversified crops
•Year round jobs
•Small subsistence plots
•Self-sufficient
• Land reform, former haciendas
• Communal ownership
• Privatization and small holdings
Traditional
Industrial Core
New periphery:
Tourism
Maquiladoras
Natural
Resources
The Borderlands
MAQUILADORAS
Initiated in the 1960s as regional employment
initiative
Assembly plants that pioneered the international
division of labour in the 1970s
Today
– >4,000 maquiladoras
– >1.2 million employees
NAFTA
Effective 1 January 1994
Trade agreement between Mexico,U.S. and
Canada:
– Reduced and regulated trade tariffs,
barriers, and quotas between 3
members
– Standardized finance & service
exchanges
– Dispute resolution mechanism
NAFTA TRADE WITH
CANADA & MEXICO
428 million consumers, world’s largest FTA
Canada and US: each other’s largest export and
import markets.
85% of all Mexican exports now go to the United
States.
75% of Mexico’s imports originate in the United
States.
Unlike EU, no social provisions, no subsidy of
poorer members, few labour provisions
ALTITUDINAL ZONATION
Middle & South America’s Vertical Climate Zones
CENTRAL AMERICA
THE REPUBLICS
Guatemala
Belize
Honduras
El Salvador
Nicaragua
Costa Rica
Panama
ENVIRONMENTAL CONCERNS
Tropical Deforestation
3 million acres of woodland in Central
America disappear each year!
CAUSES OF TROPICAL
DEFORESTATION
Clearing of rural lands to accommodate cattle
production, export cash crops, & subsistence
Rapid logging of tropical woodlands to meet
global demands for new housing, paper, and
furniture
Fuelwood: forests are cut to provide firewood
Consequences: Loss of habitat, biodiversity,
carbon sequestration, erosion & flooding
Punta Arenas, Costa Rica
Massive Clearcuts as Scenic Backdrop
Highgrading?
Punta Arenas,
Costa Rica, 10°N
Irony!
Where are the trees? 19°N, Haiti
Flooding after a hurricane is exacerbated by the absence of
forest cover on Haiti due to deforestation. Reuters photo
Soil erosion
Soil erosion is a
common result of
tropical deforestation,
especially on steep
slopes.
Note the brick red
soils indicating a
concentration of iron
and aluminum
sequioxides
THE
CARIBBEAN
BASIN