The Columbian Exchange: Crops and Animals

One of the most consequential results of the Columbian Exchange was the dispersal of food and animals from one side of the world to the other. Let's explore some of the major transfers.

Crops

The Columbian Exchange diffused new crops from the Americas to locations throughout the world.

Several food items with full description below image — A collage of "New World" domesticated plants includes (left to right, top to bottom):
maize (corn), tomato, potato, vanilla (far right); tobacco, cacao (chocolate), pará rubber tree

Potatoes were transplanted to places like Europe, Russia, and China. Because they produce heavier yields than cereal grains and can be cultivated in higher altitudes, potatoes led to increased surpluses of food. About 25% of the population growth in Afro-Eurasia between 1700 and 1900 can be attributed to the cultivation of potatoes. China, for example, experienced a rapid population growth after potatoes were widely cultivated there. Tomatoes and hot chili peppers were also transplanted from their place of origin in South America to Afro-Eurasia. Today, the cuisines we characteristically associate with Italy and Asia are unthinkable without tomatoes and hot peppers, respectively.

Cash Crops

Some American plants were cultivated as cash crops and exported to Afro-Eurasia. The Europeans learned about tobacco from the Native Americans. Although the natives did not use it recreationally, its use became widely popular with Europeans in America and in Europe. In the English colony of Jamestown, tobacco leaves were used as currency, and the exporting of tobacco as a cash crop is credited with having saved colonial Virginia from ruin.

A more important cash crop than tobacco was sugar. Indigenous to Southeast Asia, sugarcane was brought to the Caribbean by the Spanish early on. The demand for sugar in Europe grew, as it was a more convenient and potent sweetener than what was available to them. The Portuguese introduced the plantation system in Brazil to grow sugarcane.

In the early 17th century, a discovery was made that dramatically increased the cultivation of sugar. Plantation slaves discovered that molasses, a byproduct of the production of sugar that was often discarded, could be distilled into alcohol. This new product, rum, meant that sugarcane could produce two highly profitable products and had virtually no waste. Entire forests were cleared to grow sugarcane, and the plantation system proliferated across the Caribbean. This, in turn, created a tremendous demand for slaves.

The cash crops of sugar and tobacco (to a lesser extent) increased the slave trade of the Atlantic System.

Animals

Another aspect of the Columbian Exchange was the introduction of Afro-Eurasian domesticated animals to the New World.

Europeans brought pigs, cows, sheep, and cattle to the Americas, as well as rodents like rabbits and rats. With wide open spaces and virtually no natural predators, these animals quickly multiplied across the Americas; by 1700, herds of wild cattle and horses in South America reached 50 million. In North America, tribes like the Navajo became sheepherders and began to produce woolen textiles. The abundance of cattle increased the amount of meat in New World diets and provided them with hides.

The introduction of horses had an even greater effect. They dramatically increased the efficiency of hunters and warriors, and tribes like the Comanche, Apache, Blackfoot, and Sioux gained greater success in hunting the buffalo herds on the plains of North America. Alongside these animals brought by Europeans, slaves brought new plants to the New World, such as yams, okra, and black-eyed peas. Soon they became common foods that took the place of most indigenous crops, except maize (corn).

Results of the Crop Exchange

New World crops that were transplanted to Afro-Eurasia improved the variety and nutritional content of the population. The coming of potatoes, sweet potatoes, and maize to Afro Eurasia resulted in caloric and nutritional improvements over previously existing staples. Tomatoes and peppers not only added vitamins and improved the taste of Old World diets; they contributed to the development of regional cuisines.

New World food crops made different demands on the soil than crops that had been cultivated for centuries in the Old World. Fields whose fertility had declined with tireless planting of traditional crops were given new life when American crops arrived. The new crops also had different growing and harvest times. Thus, New World crops complemented crops already grown in the Old World, creating more varied, nutritional, and abundant food production.

Review: A Visual Guide to Crop and Animal Exchange

Review what we covered in this lesson using the visual guides below.

Review 01: Crops and Animals

The flashcards below contain images and descriptions of several of these important crops and animals.

Review 02: Diagram of Exchange

The diagram below shows the transfer of food, animals, and diseases.

A map is overlaid with information about products exchanged — **Map Key: The Columbian Exchange (courtesy of Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc.)**

**The Americas to Europe, Africa, and Asia:** potatoes, corn (maize), sweet potatoes, pumpkins and squash, cassava, tomatoes, pineapples, avocados, beans (kidney, navy, lima), peanuts, cashews, cacao (for chocolate), vanilla, chili peppers, sunflowers, quinine, and turkeys.

**Europe, Africa, and Asia to the Americas:** pigs, horses, cattle, chickens, sheep, rats, honeybees, grains (wheat, rice, barley, oats, rye), bananas, olives, sugarcane, citrus fruits, coffee beans, peaches and pears, apples, grapes, carrots, cabbage, lettuce, onions, soybeans, weeds (crabgrass, dandelions, thistles, wild oats), and diseases (bubonic plague, smallpox, diphtheria, typhus, measles, malaria, influenza, yellow fever, whooping cough).

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