With the explosion of coffee came about one million Europeans migrating to Brazil, most of them being Italian. Over the next thirty to fifty years, the coffee producers virtually owned most of the country and rivaled the government for power which led to a high amount of instability within the nation. This was the case in Brazil for some time until the worldwide demand for coffee fell and the coffee producers lost their power. Governmental instability and corruption continued for many years until, in 1989 Brazil had their first democratic election in almost thirty years. Unfortunately for Brazil, Fernando Collor de Mello was elected and his corruption did not improve the economy, but he was peacefully removed from office and his vice president Itamar Augusto Cautiero Franco took his place as president. Today Brazil has the fifth largest population at approximately 200 million people; however, most of these people still live near the coast with much of the jungle areas remaining …show more content…
Some of these resources include “Bauxite, gold, iron ore, manganese, nickel, phosphates, platinum, tin, rare earth elements, uranium, petroleum, hydropower, timber” and many more (“Brazil – facts and stats,” n.d.). Of these resources, the most important include iron ore, crude petroleum, soybeans and raw sugar. Brazil’s tropical climate makes it ideal for agriculture so they are a large producer of sugar and soybeans. These resources contribute to 33.7 percent or 84 billion dollars of the country’s exports. Only within the last decade has Brazil found large oil deposits in the country and just offshore. Brazil is still in the pioneer stages of oil production, but studies show that there could be up to 9 billion barrels of oil with the country so oil will remain an import resource for Brazil for years to come. In relation to oil, other sources of fuel are also produced in Brazil such as ethanol. Until 2010, Brazil was the world’s largest producer of ethanol and is now the world’s second largest after the United States; however, Brazil still has the most flex fuel vehicles, or vehicles that can run on an 85 percent ethanol 15 percent gasoline blend. Brazil was the first country to introduce vehicles that could run entirely on ethanol, the Fiat 147. Ethanol is an alcohol; the same type used in alcoholic products and is mainly made from either corn or sugarcane. Brazil’s success