Latvian-Brazilian Economic Relations 1918–1940

Abstract

This article provides an overview of Latvian-Brazilian economic relations in the interwar period. In the interwar period, economic relations between Latvia and Brazil were mainly confined to foreign trade. Latvia declared its independence in 1918, however Latvians had been emigrating to Brazil from 1890 and establishing farming colonies. By the end of the 1930s some 8000 Latvians had settled in Brazil. Latvia’s foreign trade in relation to Brazil was regulated by the 1932 Commercial Agreement. Latvia’s main imports from Brazil in the interwar period were coffee, cocoa, hides and furs, tobacco, raw rubber, and cotton, whilst Latvia’s main exports to Brazil were fish conserves, paper, and rubber goods. In general, trade and thus economic relations were of marginal significance to both countries in the interwar period due partly to some similarities in their economic structures, but mainly because of geographical distance.