Peru :: essays research papers

PeruPerus gross municipal product in the latish mid-eighties was $19.6 billion, orabout $920 per capita. Although the saving remains primarily agricultural, themining and tiping industries have become increasingly important. Peru reliesprimarily on the export of raw materialschiefly minerals, farm products, andfish mealto earn foreign exchange for importing machinery and manufacturedgoods. During the late mid-eighties, guerrilla violence, rampant inflation, chronicbudget deficits, and drought combined to reason the country to the brink offiscal insolvency. However, in 1990 the government imposed an ascesis programthat removed price controls and ended subsidies on many radical items and allowedthe inti, the national currency, to float against the United States dollar.About 35 percent of Perus work population is engaged in farming.Most of the coastal area is devote to the raising of export crops on the montaa and the sierra are in the main grown crops for local consumptio n. Many farms inPeru are very teensy and are utilise to produce subsistence crops the country alsohas large conjunct farms. The chief agricultural products, together with theapproximate annual yield (in mensural scores) in the late 1980s, were sugarcane (6.2 one million million million), potatoes (2 million), rice (1.1 million), corn (880,000), seed cotton wool(280,000), coffee (103,000), and wheat (134,000). Peru is the worlds leadinggrower of coca, from which the drug cocaine is refined.The stemma population acceptd about 3.9 million cattle, 13.3 millionsheep, 1.7 million goats, 2.4 million hogs, 875,000 horses and mules, and 52million poultry. Llamas, sheep, and vicuas provide wool, hides, and skins.The forests covering 54 percent of Perus land area have not been significantly exploited. Forest products include balsa lumber and balata gum,rubber, and a variety of medicinal plants. far-famed among the latter is thecinchona plant, from which quinine is derived. The annual r oundwood harvest inthe late 1980s was 7.7 million cu m.The fishing industry is extremely important to the countrys rescue andaccounts for a significant portion of Perus exports. It underwent a remarkableexpansion afterward World War II (1939-1945) the catch in the late 1980s was about5.6 million metric tons annually. More than three-fifths of the catch isanchovies, used for making fish meal, a product in which Peru leads the world.The extractive industries figure significantly in the Peruvian economy.Peru ranks as one of the worlds leading producers of copper, silver, lead, andzinc petroleum, innate gas, iron ore, molybdenum, tungsten, and gold areextracted in significant quantities. Annual drudgery in the late 1980sincluded 3.3 million metric tons of iron ore 406,400 metric tons of copper