Brazilian Portuguese signed into law by the President on 21 July 2008 allowing for a 6-year adaptation period, during which both orthographies co-existed. All of the CPLP countries have signed the reform. In Brazil, this reform has been in force since January 2016. Portugal and other Portuguese-speaking countries have since begun using the new orthography. Regional varieties of Brazilian Portuguese, while remaining mutually intelligible, may diverge from each other in matters such as vowel pronunciation and speech intonation. The existence of Portuguese in Brazil is a legacy of the Portuguese colonization of the Americas. The first wave of Portuguese-speaking immigrants settled in
Dutch colonization of the Americas independence prompted many to migrate to the Netherlands. Political instability and economic decline after independence resulted in even more migration to the Netherlands. The Surinamese community in the Netherlands is now almost as large as half of the population in the country itself (about 350,000). Dutch colonization of the Americas The Dutch colonization of the Americas began with the establishment of Dutch trading posts and plantations in the Americas, which preceded the much wider known colonisation activities of the Dutch in Asia. While the first Dutch fort in Asia was built in 1600 (in present-day Indonesia), the first forts and