Columbian Exchange Essay

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The Columbian Exchange of plants and animals richly improved the European diet. They helped improve and diversify tastes along with increasing Old World societies' abilities to feed more people. Starvation had long limited population growth in Europe. But not anymore. It was largely overcome through the transplantation of New World foods. Plants that were interchanged through the Columbian Exchange helped Europe's population flourish. Plants like corn, potatoes, and cassava proved to be much more efficient sources of carbohydrates than wheat, which was the standard crop in Europe. Corn, potatoes, and cassava yielded twice as many calories as wheat. This increased calories that were outputted by farmers who adopted New World crops. They helped to fuel a surge in Europe’s population. The colonies the Europeans established in the New World became efficient producers of New World plants and Old World plants as well. North America became a key producer of not only corn but also wheat. The Caribbean and South America came hosts to the plantations of Old World cash crops such as sugar and coffee. The Columbian Exchange increased the health and wealth of Europeans and their colonists in the Americas. Animals that were interchanged through the Columbian Exchange made good and bad impacts on Europe. Some impacts were the transformation of grasslands and revolutionizing of labor. Overgrazing by herds of sheep was the reasons for the transformation of the grasslands. The availability of horse, donkey, and ox were responsible for the new power force for the land. The difference between the animals on the different sides of the Atlantic was extraordinary. The natives only had a few animals. They had the dog, camel, guinea pig, and fowls. Columbus brought horses, dogs, pigs, cattle, chickens, sheep, and goats. When the explorers brought the new animals across the ocean it

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