In 1900 the total foreign trade aggregated upward of two hundred and seventy-five million dollars. The imports consist of cotton and woollen manufactures, structural steel and machinery, preserved fish and meats, and coal-oil. Great Britain, Germany, the United States, and France have nearly all the trade. The United States sells to Brazil textiles and coal-oil to the amount of over eleven million dollars yearly, and buys of the country coffee and rubber to the amount of six times as much. _Rio de Janeiro_, commonly called "Rio," is the capital and commercial centre. Its harbor is one of the best in South America. Formerly all the coffee was shipped from this port, but the greater part now goes from _Santos_. _Porto Alegre_, the port of the German colonies, has also a growing export trade. _Bahia_, _Pernambuco_ (or _Recife_), _Maceio_, _Ceara_ are the markets for cotton, sugar, and tobacco, much of which is shipped to other Brazilian ports for home consumption. _Para_ and _Ceara_ monopolize nearly all the rubber trade. The position of _Manaos_, at the confluence of several rivers, makes it one of the most important markets of the Amazon basin, and most of the crude rubber is first collected there for shipment. _Cuyaba_ is the commercial centre of the mining region; its outlet is the Paraguay River, and Buenos Aires profits by its trade. =Argentina and the Plate River Countries.=--These states are situated in a latitude corresponding to that of the United States. The entire area from the coast to the slopes of the Andes is a vast prairie-region. As a result of position, climate, and surface the agricultural industries are the same as in the United States--grazing and wheat-growing. Cattle-growing is the chief employment, and the cost per head of rearing stock is practically nothing. For want of better means of transportation the shipments of live beef are not very heavy; the quality of the beef is poor, and until recently there have been no adequate facilities for getting it to market.[66] A small amount of refrigerator beef and a large amount of jerked beef are exported, however. Near the markets, there are large plants in which the hides, horns, tallow, and meat are utilized--the last being converted to the famous "beef extract," which finds a market all over the world. The sheep industry is on a much better business basis. Both the wool and the mutton have been improved by cross-breeding with good stock. As a result the trade in mutton and wool has increased by leaps and bounds; and nearly three million sheep carcasses are landed at the other ports of Brazil, at Cuba, and at various European states. The wool is bought mainly by Germany and France, but the United States is a heavy purchaser. The quality of the fibre, formerly very poor, year by year is improving.