ABSTRACT
The first attempts to create a textile industry in Uruguay date back to the last quarter of the nineteenth century. Only in the beginning of the twentieth century did they start to meet with some success. Traditionally agricultural products had been Uruguay's main export product. Until 1930 the food industry, which was responsible for nearly 50 per cent of total value added, dominated Uruguayan manufacturing industry. Within the food sector the meat industry, which produced the country's main export product, was central, followed by the beverage and textile industries. These had risen and expanded since the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth century. The textile industry had developed late and moderately compared to other branches until the end of the First World War. By the early 1920s, it had received a major boost, becoming the second sector in manufacturing industry measured in value added. By then, the Uruguayan economy, based on the export of agricultural products, was able to retain, albeit with fluctuations, a dynamism that allowed an improvement in living standards and population growth, mainly fed by immigration. Although the industry was still weak, it offered a substitute for textile imports.
