Latin America Update #19

Heavy, flooding rains soaked southern parts of Brazil during the last week, as a ribbon of little to no rainfall stretched through central parts of South America. Drought remains firmly entrenched in central-western Colombia and poor rains have settled in across Ecuador.

Much of Mato Grosso do Sul and nearby parts of Minas Gerais and São Paulo states, in Brazil, received very heavy rainfall during the last week. The heavy rains triggered flooding and landslides across the region. This area, however was largely alone in South America, as most of the continent turned drier.

A ribbon of poor rainfall stretched, last week, from Amazonas state down through Rondônia and Moto Grosso states, across most of Bolivia and down into northern Argentina, Uruguay. The three Brazilian states north of Uruguay; Rio Grande do Sul, Santa Catarina, and Paraná, were also very dry. Poor rains was also a problem in a separate area, in Ecuador and nearby parts of Peru. Most of these areas should not have major problems with this week of dry weather, especially as next week looks to be very wet across most of the continent.

The west coast of Colombia continues to have a very small area that has been perpetually dry for the last two months, any crops in this area, which had flooding as recently as December, have likely failed. Little to no rainfall is expected in this area during the coming week.