South America

**South America** is the continent to the south of North America. These two continents are separated by the Panama Canal. There are seven continents which make up the globe, South America being the 4th largest. South America includes 12 countries: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Paraguay, Peru, Suriname, Uruguay, and Venezuela.

South America is attached to Central America at the boundary of Panama. Geographically all of Panama – including the part east of the Panama Canal is usually included in North America alone, among the countries of Central America.

## List of Countries

|Flag|Official name(s)|Area (km² or sq mi)|Population|Density (pop. km²)|Capital|Official language(s)|||
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
|align="center"||align="center"|Argentina <small>Argentine Republic</small>||46,621,847|16|Buenos Aires|Spanish|
|align="center"||align="center"|Bolivia <small>Plurinational State of Bolivia</small>||12,186,079|11|Sucre|Spanish Quechua Aymara|
|align="center"||align="center"|Brazil <small>Federative Republic of Brazil</small>||218,689,757|17|Brasillia|Portuguese|
|align="center"||align="center"|Chile <small>Republic of Chile</small>||18,549,457|22|Santiago|Spanish|
|align="center"||align="center"|Colombia <small>Republic of Colombia</small>||49,336,454|23|Bogota|Spanish|
|align="center"||align="center"|Ecuador <small>Republic of Ecuador</small>||17,483,326|44|Quito|Spanish|
|align="center"||align="center"|Guyana <small>Co-operative Republic of Guyana</small>||791,739|4|Georgetown|English|
|align="center"||align="center"|Paraguay <small>Republic of Paraguay</small>||7,439,863|18|Asuncion|Spanish Guarani|
|align="center"||align="center"|Peru <small>Republic of Peru</small>||32,440,172|17|Lima|Spanish Aymara|
|align="center"||align="center"|Suriname <small>Republic of Suriname</small>||639,539|4|Paramaribo|Dutch|
|align="center"||align="center"|Uruguay <small>Republic of Uruguay</small>||3,416,264|33|Montevideo|Spanish|
|align="center"||align="center"|Venezuela <small>Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela</small>||30,518,260|20|Caracas|Spanish|

## Natural resources

The soil in Argentina's Pampas is among the best in the world. Brazil's soil is very good for growing coffee. A great number of minerals have been found. Few, however, have been mined. Among those that were mined are iron, manganese, gold, and gemstones. The tropical forests are rich in valuable trees, like mahogany, ebony, and rubber.  Oil is also a resource in some places.

## Wildlife

South America is home to a large variety of animal life. These include animals such as jaguars, macaws, monkeys, anacondas, llamas, piranhas, toucans, rheas, tapirs, cougars, condors and chinchillas.

## Tourist attractions

The most popular attractions are:
- Machu Picchu, a historic site in Peru which is a city made of stone and has an over 26 mile marathon.
- The Iguazu Falls, a waterfall on the border between Argentina and Brazil
- The Angel Falls, the world's tallest waterfall, in Venezuela
- Rio de Janeiro in Brazil is a huge city, famous for its carnival, beaches (Copacabana and Ipanema), and 38m statue of Jesus Christ.
- The Patagonia region in Argentina and Chile

## The Amazon rain forest

The amazon rain forest is a moist grassy land where many wild animals live and contains the amazon river which is the 2nd longest river in the world and has the largest volume of water. The world's longest river is the Nile in Africa. The forest is known as a rain forest as it rains very often but due to the dense surroundings not every droplet reaches the bottom. The Amazon is shared by eight **countries** (Brazil, Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Venezuela, Guyana and Suriname) and stretches for 6.7 million kilometers<sup>2</sup>. In the amazon rain forest, hundreds of thousands of trees have been cut down for wood and paper, meaning that the forest is endangered. Unlike the Boreial forest in Canada the trees are not getting replanted.

## Related pages

- Latin America
- Americas
- Latin American Literature