Twenty-five years ago, Bolivia had among Latin America’s highest rates of malnutrition and lowest levels of agricultural technology. Then in 1985, the government put the country on a path of agricultural improvement. Generous credit and the low-cost sale of public lands helped to modernize the agricultural sector, especially in the fertile eastern lowlands that border Brazil and Paraguay. Technology was imported as well to spur large-scale mechanized agriculture. A new day seemed to be at hand. The export of soybeans, the lowlands’ principal commodity, boomed, rising from US$20 million in 1985 to $143 million in 1995. Government planners said large-scale soy would help feed the nation and earn the cash to import what the country couldn’t produce. Unfortunately, things haven’t... [Log in to read more]