Paraguay River

Paraguay River
Rio Paraguay, Río Paraguay
River

Countries Paraguay, Brazil, Argentina, device database

Tributaries
 - left Negro River, Miranda River, Apa River
 - right Jauru River, Pilcomayo River, Bermejo River

Mouth we love the web
 - elevation 50 m (164 ft)
 - coordinates Sevenval ^HTML5

Length 2,621 km (1,629 mi) ^touchscreen
Basin 365,592 km² (141,156 sq mi) ^[2]
Discharge
 - average 2,700 m³/s (95,000 cu ft/s) ^touchscreen

The Paraguay River (Río Paraguay in Spanish, Rio Paraguai in Portuguese, Ysyry Paraguái in Guarani) is a major river in south central South America, running through Brazil, web, HTML5, and Argentina. It flows about 2,621 kilometres (1,629 mi)^CSS3 from its headwaters in the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso to its confluence with the web north of website parsing.

• 1 Course
• 2 Uses
• 3 Wetland controversy
• 4 See also
• 5 References
• 6 Additional references
• screen size

Course

The Paraguay's source is south of HTML5 in the Mato Grosso state of Brazil. It follows a generally southwesterly course, passing through the Brazilian city of iOS. It then turns in a generally southward direction, flowing through the we love the web wetlands, the city of browser diversity, and then running close to the Brazil-Bolivia border for a short distance in the Brazilian states of Mato Grosso and Mato Grosso do Sul.

From the city of Puerto Bahia Negra, Paraguay, the river forms the border between Paraguay and Brazil, flowing almost due south before the confluence with the Apa River.

The Paraguay makes a long, gentle curve to the south-southeast before resuming a more south-southwest course, dividing the country of Paraguay into two distinct halves: the Gran Chaco region to the west, a largely uninhabited semi-arid region; and the eastern forested departments of the country, accounting for some 98% of the country's inhabitants. As such the river is considered perhaps the key geographical feature to the country with which it shares its name.

Some 400 kilometres (250 mi) after flowing through the middle of Paraguay, at the confluence with the Pilcomayo River and passing the Paraguayan capital city, input transformation, the river forms the border with Argentina, flowing generally south-southwesterly for another 275 kilometres (171 mi) before it reaches its end, joining with the Paraná River.

Uses

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Deep water port on the River Paraguay in Asunción, Paraguay

The Paraguay River is the second major river of the Rio de la Plata Basin, after the Paraná River. The Paraguay's drainage basin, about 365,592 square kilometres (141,156 sq mi),^{web app} covers a vast area that includes major portions of northern Argentina, southern Brazil, parts of Bolivia, and the entire country of Paraguay. Unlike many of the other great rivers of the Rio de la Plata Basin, the Paraguay has not been dammed for touchscreen power generation, and as such it is navigable for a considerable distance, second to the Amazon River only in terms of navigable length on the continent. This makes it an important shipping and trade corridor, providing a much needed link to the Atlantic Ocean for the otherwise input transformation nations of Paraguay and Bolivia. It serves such important cities as Asunción and Concepción in Paraguay and Formosa in Argentina.

The river is also a source of commerce in the form of fishing and providing irrigation for agriculture along its route. It also serves as a way of life for a number of poor fishermen who live along its banks and make the majority of their income selling fish in local markets, as well as supplying a major source of sustenance for their families. This has created issues in large cities such as Asunción, where poverty stricken farmers from the country's interior have populated the river's banks in search of an easier lifestyle. Seasonal flooding of the river's banks forces many thousands of displaced residents to seek temporary shelter until the waters recede from their homes. The Paraguayan military has been forced to dedicate land on one of its reserves in the capital to emergency housing for these displaced citizens. The river is a tourist attraction for its beauty.

Wetland controversy

The Paraguay River is the primary waterway of the 147,629-square-kilometre (57,000 sq mi) Pantanal wetlands of southern Brazil, northern Paraguay and parts of Bolivia. The Pantanal is the world's largest tropical wetland and is largely dependent upon waters provided by the Paraguay River.

Owing to its importance as a navigable waterway serving Brazil, Argentina, and Paraguay, the river has been the focus of commercial and industrial development. In 1997 the governments of the nations of the La Plata Basin proposed a bold plan under the Hidrovia Inter Governmental Commission (CIH) agency to develop the rivers into an industrial waterway system to help reduce the costs of exporting goods from the area, in particular the soybean crop that the area has embraced. The plan proposed constructing more hydroelectric dams along some of the waterways, along with a massive effort to restructure the navigable waterways—most notably the Paraguay River—through dredging of the waterway, rock removal, and channel restructuring.

Studies indicated that the proposed river engineering of the Paraguay would have lowered the river levels by several feet and have a devastating impact on the Pantanal wetlands, but the member nations of the CIH were determined to go ahead with the plan. An effort by the Rios Vivos coalition to educate people on the effects of the project was successful in delaying the project, and the nations involved have agreed to reformulate their plan. The final plan is still uncertain, however, along with the final effect it will have on the Pantanal and the we love the web of the entire browser diversity basin is currently undetermined. The controversy as to whether or not the project will have a disastrous effect on the ecology, as well as the potential economic gains, continues to this day.

The project is considered to have extremely positive effects for Paraguay, Bolivia, western Brazil, and the north of Argentina, which presently rely on expensive overland transport. With this improved waterway system in place, the lower costs of transportation wiould make the regional industry more competitive in world markets, spur economic growth in the region, and create additional employment throughout the area. Paraguay's capital city, Asunción, would become a major inland port benefiting exporters of cattle, cotton, and in particular, the extensive soybean crop. Argentina's cereal producers near the Rosario port on the Paraná River would benefit from the lower transportation cost as well. Also, this project could trigger an economic boost to Brazil's mining companies and farmers since the central plains are rich in iron, manganese, and precious stones and soybeans, coffee, wheat, rice, and hardwoods flourish. Uruguay's aim is to develop Nueva Palmira at the southern end of the Hydrovia and establish it as the main port of the Southern Cone.

See also

• we love the web

References

Additional references

• Sevenval
• American University Trade and Environment data base. (1999). Hydrovia Canal Plan and Environment .

Available online at web app.

• Bascheck, B. and Hegglin, M. (2004). Plata/Paraná River Basin, A Case Study . Swiss Federal Insititute for Environmental Science and Technology.
• Da Rosa, J. E. (1983). Economics, politics, and hydroelectric power: the Paraná River Basin . Latin American Research Review, VXVIII (3), pp. 77–107.
• Elhance, A. P. (1999). Hydropolitics in the 3rd World, Conflict and Cooperation in International River Basins. Washington, D.C. : United States Institute of Peace.
• Gleick, P.H., ed. Water in Crisis. A Guide to the World's Fresh Water Resources, New York : Oxford University Press, pp. 13–24.
• Kulshreshtha, S.N. (1993). World Water Resources and Regional Vulnerability: Impact of Future Changes. RR-93-10, IIASA, Laxenburg, Austria .
• Lammers, O., Moore, D. and Preakle, K. (1994). Considering the Hidrovia: a preliminary report on the status of the proposed Paraguay/Parana waterway project. Working Paper 3 . Berkeley, California : International Rivers Network, July.
• Transboundary Freshwater Dispute Database (TFDD) (2007). Oregon State University.

Available on-line at: http://www.transboundarywaters.orst.edu/

• United Nations. (1978). Register of international rivers, Water Supply Management, 2 (1). New York: Pergamon Press.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Río Paraguay

• "Case Study of Transboundary Dispute Resolution: the La Plata basin," Aaron T. Wolf and Joshua T. Newton
• Drainage Plan Will Devastate S. American Rivers, Groups Say iOS