ABSTRACT
This chapter analyzes the impact of the expansion of commercial agriculture on the rural population of Central America in the postwar period. It deals with a discussion of the merits of the agro-export development model in countries with gross disparities in the distribution of key resources. Central America entered the contemporary period with land distributions that were grossly unequal. Income distribution figures for each of the Central American countries make it clear that there is a direct relationship between access to land and rural families' incomes. Central America entered the contemporary period with gross inequalities in access to land because of the agrarian transformations of the Conquest, the colonial period, and the Liberal reform era. The spread of commercial agriculture and the rapid expansion of the share of land devoted to agricultural commodities aimed at foreign markets are fundamental causes of the continuing misery of many of the rural people in Central America.
