Geography of South America world by drainage area—the Amazon River and the more southerly Paraná River. The other major river of this central lowland is the Orinoco River, which has a natural channel linking it with the Amazon. Most of this central lowland is sparsely populated because the soils are heavily leached, but in the south is the very fertile pampas of Argentina—one of the world's major food-producing regions where wheat and beef cattle are pre-eminent. The natural vegetation of the northern lowlands are either savanna in the northern "llanos" and southern "campos", or tropical rainforest throughout most of the Amazon basin. Efforts to
Geography of Uruguay the promotion of wheat production. One exception, rice, most of which was produced in the east, had become a major nontraditional export in recent years. Stretching west along the Río de la Plata from Montevideo, are the agricultural and dairying departments of San José and Colonia. To the north along the Río Uruguay lie the departments of Soriano, Río Negro, Paysandú and Salto. Their western halves form part of the litoral, a region that is somewhat more developed than the interior. Here soils are alluvial and more fertile, favoring crop production and farms of more modest size than in the