Brazil’s three southern states escape the worst ravages of recession

MAKESHIFT stalls appear on every country road in Brazil, usually laden with bananas and coconuts. On the back roads of Brazil’s three southern states—Paraná, Santa Catarina and Rio Grande do Sul—the staple is loops of smoked sausage. Like the garden gnomes that sometimes stand guard, the Wursts are a legacy of immigrants from Germany, Poland and other central European countries who, along with northern Italians, settled the region from the mid-19th century.

Southern Brazil, an area the size of France with a population of 29m, feels like a region apart in other ways. Temperatures can drop below freezing on hilly terrain; shacks in poor neighbourhoods of coastal cities are topped with pitched roofs, as if built for snow. Southerners prefer yerba mate tea to cafezinhos, and look as much towards Uruguay and Argentina as to the rest of Brazil. Florianópolis, Santa Catarina’s capital, has flights to Buenos Aires but not to Belo Horizonte, the capital of Minas Gerais, Brazil’s second-biggest state. 

These days, the difference southerners most want to talk about is an economic one....Continue reading

from Americas http://ift.tt/2fVRNwn
via https://ifttt.com/ IFTTT