The First World War and coal trade geography in Latin America and the Caribbean (1890-1930)

This paper aims to illustrate the dynamics of coal trade between Latin America and its main trade partners, i.e. the USA, Great Britain and Germany, before and after the enormous disruption caused by the First World War. The coal trade was used as an indicator of modernization for Latin American countries, given that oil was at that time of secondary importance. Energy imports have determined the possibilities of each Latin American country in its process of development. Here we address this question and place special emphasis on supply channels, concluding that the trade link with main suppliers was of key significance. Although this was very clear by the end of the period, the process had started well before the First World War, at least for the majority of LA&C countries. These points are developed through a gravity model applied to the bilateral coal trade. The importance of the market supplier share is addressed through cluster methodologies.coal trade, latin american and caribbean trade, economic geography, economic trade dependency

Explaining vineyard specialization in the province of Barcelona (Spain) in the mid-19th century

We present a statistical model of agrarian vineyard specialization in the province of Barcelona towards 1860, that combines the Boserupian push of population increase, the demand pull of a Smithian-type of growth (measured by the time-distances to the nearest seaport), and the agrological lands suitability for sowing grain or growing vines (as measured by water stress, slopes and frost risk). The overall outcome of the adjusted R2 levels, which range from 0.608 to 0.826, can be considered very successful. The inequality in land ownership is another factor that we believe to have played an important role, but has had to be omitted for the moment due to the lack of statistical data. Further research is also needed to deal with a possible endogeneity problem that working with socio-demographic variables entails.wine international market integration, regional land-use patterns, vineyard specialization, population pressure, agrological suitability