A Comparative Study of the Salvadorean and Nicaraguan Cotton Sectors

Since the boom in cotton farming, this sector has played a vital role in the economies of Central America. Over the past decades, cotton-growing both in Nicaragua and El Salvador has brought economic development in terms of the generation of income, employment, economic infrastructure in the countryside, as well as the provision of foreign exchange. The effects of accelerating capitalist development in the countryside have been the expulsion of peasants from the cotton regions, their proletarianisation and marginalisation. In addition, the production of basic grains has diminished through the expansion of this agro-export sector, while cotton production has created less employment than it destroyed, and has been accompanied by bad working conditions and low wages.