Maps are great because they allow us to learn about the way a country's territory is
And statistics are great because they allow us to learn about the country itself
When you put the two together, you learn even more as you get to learn about the country
but also about its territory compared to each other. So today, we're going to take a look at these types of maps
Territorial ones, but also statistical. Brazil has a very interesting territorial history
As we can see on this GIF, its expansion since the early Portuguese settling and colonialism
dividing the Brazilian coast into rectangular captaincies, then expanding into the interior
with several periods of growth, one or two instances of losing territory, and many territorial
reorganizations. The Brazilian natives also certainly had their own territorial organization before the Europeans arrived and started drawing their own lines, but I couldn't find any map that
depicts those tribal regions and borders in all of Brazil's current territory. The best was this
one, which shows the groups of indigenous people on each area of Brazil's coast at around the 16th
century, precisely when the Portuguese arrived. Oddly enough, the number of native groups, 14
almost matches the number of captaincies, 16, established. Or this other one, depicting the
native language families. Today, the indigenous reserves are very limited, as much of the territory
has been taken, but there are still some completely uncontacted tribes in the Amazon forest
When the Portuguese arrived, they established those 16 captaincies, which soon grew into
other territories and states as they expanded. And today, the country is divided into 26 states and one federal district
And each of these, even the smaller ones, are big. This map attributes a country to each state according to its size, and look how many big
countries fit into it. Venezuela, Germany, Finland, the UK, Italy, Mongolia, Portugal, Angola, France, and many others
In addition, these states are sometimes grouped into five regions. North, Northeast, Center-West, Southeast, and South
If you want, I can make a video about the territorial evolution itself in more detail
but for this video, I just wanted to show you the summary so you can understand how the territory has grown
and organized itself since the beginning and how it is now. And this early colonial settling on the coast may explain the next map, which tells us about
population density. Brazil has a total of 212 million people. That is a lot. For you to get an
idea, it's as much as every single other southern American country put together, but the way in which
they are distributed along the territory is not equal. This seems to be a constant in many
countries we've seen so far. Perhaps due to the early settling on the coast, or perhaps just because
Because of the coastal feature itself, these eastern states have a lot more population
density than the rest We should however note that the western interior states are much larger so even if they had the same population they would be less densely populated but the fact is when you look at a map
of the states by absolute population numbers, the eastern coastal ones still show up ahead
here depicted in the darkest shade, representing more population. Before we keep going with the
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choose to continue with a full membership. Now, back to the video. Because of this
the coastal states also have better or rather bigger economies, as we can see on this map
where darker shades represent each state's GDP size. However, when we compare the same map with
values from 100 years ago, these are slightly but not entirely adjusted for inflation, so keep that
in mind, but the difference was much bigger. So, we can conclude that while the coastal states are
still richer in GDP due to having more population and more developed economies, the difference
between them and the interior states has been significantly reduced and should it continue
the larger states may even one day surpass them, taking advantage of their significantly larger
sizes. In fact, in this map, we can see the 2020 GDP growth prediction, with the coastal regions
falling and the interior ones growing, as long as the growth isn't done at the expense of natural
reserves, which seems to have sadly sometimes been the case in the Amazon forest. In fact
in this map, we can see that, from a New York Times article in 2019. In red, we can see the
deforestation caused by fires in that year, and in yellow, we can see the deforestation that had
already happened up to the year before, caused both by fires but also by humans. An incredibly
big amount of territory which has sadly been lost. Both a consequence through fires and a cause
through human action. This issue is heavily connected to climate change. In this map
we can see the prediction of temperature increase by 2050 and save a couple exceptions on the coast
the interior states are projected to register the biggest increase in temperature, all above
2 degrees Celsius and some even reaching 3. I was struggling to find good maps with Brazilian stats until I came across this Instagram account
Brazil e Mapax meaning Brazil in maps All credit to a few of these maps goes to them you should definitely check out their page if you like these types of things One of theirs is related to GDP and it this great one showing 10 Brazilian cities which by themselves contribute 25 of the national GDP And as we can
see, 8 of them are in coastal states, with the only exceptions being the Capital Federal District
and Manaus, with Sao Paulo representing a whopping 10% of the national GDP and Rio de Janeiro 5%
Coastal cities worldwide tend to be more prosperous and would usually be the preferred place for
settling due to the water resources and proximity to rivers. Speaking of water, what about Brazil's
rivers? Brazil has many, one of which, the Amazon, being the second largest in the world
just behind the Nile, although some people claim it's even bigger. There are at least
22 significant rivers, but 12 main ones which lead to the country's hydrographic basins
essentially the areas which are connected to each specific main river. We can see them here on this
map, the biggest of which is definitely that of the Amazons. Briefly going back into population
we have another interesting topic, which is ethnicity. Brazil is a country of many ethnicities
and origins, and according to their own statistical institution, they consider 47.5% of the population
to be of European descent, 43.4% to descend of various ethnicities, 7.5% of African descent
1% of Asian and only 0.4% indigenous. According to this 2009 data, outdated but I don't think that
much when it comes to this, the states with the higher percentages of European descendants are
in the south. People of various ethnicities are the most common all around but especially in the
north-northwest and Bahia is the state where people of African descent represent a bigger
percentage of the population. This map from the 2010 census divides the information into provinces
showing the biggest ethnic group in each of them. And as we can see, almost only in the Amazon forest
region are natives dominant. And it's odd that we don't see Asian descendants as dominant anywhere
because Brazil has a lot of them. In this map, we can see the amount of Japanese immigrants in each
state, ranging from just around 1,000 to over 1 million in the state of Sao Paulo, for instance
and being a total of around 1.8 million countrywide. The reasons why there are so many people from
Japan living in Brazil might be many but it all seems to have started with a treaty between the
two countries' governments permitting Japanese migration to Brazil. This was due in part to a
decrease of Italian immigration at the time and a labor shortage that the country was facing. These
days they are likely to be fully integrated and perhaps therefore shown as people of mixed origins
with not many first-generation immigrants left. In this other map we can see the main source of
immigration per country in each brazilian state it's a very big mix of origin countries and these
aren't organized by number of people as far as i know so while you can have americans as the
biggest source of immigration in a number of states maybe germans moved in greater number despite only being the biggest number in one state But Brazil continues to have growing immigrant communities from Portugal Italy Spain Germany Japan China
France, the United Kingdom, the US, and Cuba, among many others. Although the Cuban one is strange
because how can they be moving to Acre when it doesn't even exist? Speaking of people
how long do they live? This next map shows us the average life expectancy per state
and we can see a big difference between them, almost as big as what we saw for the US. The
southeast states have an average life expectancy of 77 to 79 years, a few others all around from
74 to 76, but many of them, especially in the north and northwest, have life expectancies of
only 70 to 73 years, a difference of 9 years between states in some of these cases. That is a lot
The logical justification I can come up with for this is that the southern states have more
developed economies and therefore more quality of life for their citizens. However, when you look at
the HDI map for Brazilian states, the Human Development Index, which measures health
knowledge, and standard of living, the differences aren't that big between states, the majority of
them being close to the ideal 1.0, at 0.8 and above, and the rest in the 0.7s. Something that
impacts the standard of living is the ability to work and earn a living wage. In the next maps
we can see the evolution of states' unemployment rates from 2014 to 2020, with every single state
increasing and in many cases a lot. Bahia reaches 20% unemployment. This is a good representation
of the serious economic crisis that Brazil has been facing since 2014. Briefly going back to
territory, we have this map showing us the division between private and public property in the country
There is a very small amount of state-owned land, at least when compared to other countries. For
instance, in the US, state-owned land is a lot. Curiously, also in the western part of the country
The vast majority of Brazil's territory in yellow is private property and only in the Amazon forest
region, or at least in the interior states, do we see larger segments of land that are under the
ownership of the state. Perhaps natural reserves within the forest. So, those are a few interesting
maps of Brazil that teach us a little bit about the country, about its territory and how it is
organized, about its people, and what characterizes them, how they live, how long they live, where they
are from, and what their heritage is. Also allowing us to understand the differences between the
country's states. There are pretty much an infinite amount of maps we can use for this purpose, as
there are statistics about everything, and it's always interesting to see how different parts of
a country, or different countries even, compare when it comes to a specific issue or topic. If you
have any additional topic suggestions for comparisons, let me know in the comments. Also
Also feel free to point out any statistics that you think are not correct and leave any
ideas you have for other countries about which I can make this type of video
Subscribe if you want and I will see you next time for more general knowledge