Positive Effects Of The Columbian Exchange

The Columbian Exchange was a time period in which trading and exchanges were completed between the Old and New Worlds. The man in which it was centered around is Christopher Columbus, an Italian explorer and navigator, who is credited with discovering the New World. Although he was looking for a quicker trade route to Asia, Columbus stumbled upon North America and changed the way people lived all around the globe. Exploration was a crucial piece of European life, so its not surprising that the Spanish Monarchy funded Columbus’ journey. Even though the Columbian exchange was nothing short of extraordinary, there are constant debates on whether it had a positive or negative effect on the New World. Overall, the Columbian Exchange was a negative event for the New World because it brought over diseases that killed devastating amounts of Native Americans, forced survivors into slavery, and transported animals as well as pests that ran rampant around the local environments
The diseases that the European explorers brought …show more content…
It was the explorers that gave the New World horses, cows, pigs, bed bugs, house flies, cockroaches, tumbleweeds, and wild oats. Although the introduction of horses is arguably a positive aspect of the Columbian exchange due to the fact that they increased Indian fighting and mobility, the negative outweighs the positive. When the horses were placed in the new environment-which was perfect for them-their population exploded, and they promptly trampled local environments. Cows took over any grassland they could reach, and pigs ate indigenous plant life, as well as shellfish and sweet potatoes. While the Native Americans had to deal with the damaging wildlife placed upon them, Europeans enjoyed a wide variety of agriculture taken from the New World. The foreign plants dominated the native ones, and invaded every