If you haven’t heard or read about it yet, the first game of the 2010 World Cup has been finished. The opening game was
between South Africa and Mexico. The game was a 1-1 draw with South Africa scoring early and Mexico fighting back to tie it up. It was a great beginning to this Cup, and it should be full of many more exciting games.
In this fourth part of my World Cup Series, I will be investigating the South American country of Chile. The nation, located on the west side of South America, is a narrow long country that sits between the Andes on the East and the Pacfic Ocean on the West. The nation is only approx. 100 miles across, which about the same width as the distance between New York City and Philadelphia. The nation also claims the most southern of the Equator civilization. Geography aside, Chile is one of today’s rising markets and overshadowed by its northern colleague Brazil.
Chile leads the South America in many developmental indexes: Human Development Index (ranked 44th in world), Quality of LIfe (ranked 31st in the world), and economic freedom (ranked 10th in the world). Chile is second in South America in GDP per capita, at $14,241 – only $300 behind Argentina. The nation has the world’s 46th largest economy with a GDP at $169 billion, which has grown just over 130% in the past eight years as Chile has globalized itself very well.
The nation has a rich history full of conquest and abundant potential. When first colonized in the 16th Century, the Spaniards originally liked Chile for its agricultural potential that lie in its valley between the ocean and Andes mountains. The nation in the early 19th Century revolted against the Spanish, after they were defeated by Joseph Bonaparte back in Europe. The
nation got its independence in 1818, and it has held it ever since. One of the differences of Chile to the other nations that I have examined is that Chile has been independent for nearly two centuries compared to 50 years for Nigeria, 20 for Slovenia, and less than 100 for Honduras. This stability has allowed for Chile to develop many of its developmental as well as economical indexes.
The nation has gone through political ups and downs, but it has a stable democracy that has lasted for the past thirty years. The nation elected a female president in 2006, who served a…
