What is Uruguay rich in?

When people say ‘Uruguay’, most recall Punta del Este’s beaches or mate in a thermos. Few know that a country roughly the size of Belarus is among the world’s top 10 beef exporters, makes some of the planet’s best Tannat, and grows oranges eaten in Europe in winter.

We examined the country’s agricultural map by department. The result is a portrait that greatly changes how we see what sustains this country.

West: soy, wheat and legendary canned meat

Soriano harvests around 30% of all national soy and 22% of wheat. The soils are deep and fertile, and the port of Nueva Palmira is close by. Land here costs about US$8,700 per hectare — among the highest prices in the country.

Río Negro is also a grain-growing department, but is remembered for something else. In 1859, a meat-processing plant opened in Fray Bentos that literally fed the British Empire. Fray Bentos canned meat and Oxo stock cubes went from here around the world. In 2015, UNESCO placed the industrial complex on its World Heritage List — the only site of its kind in Latin America.

Colonia lives on milk and cheese. Swiss settlers opened the first cheese dairies back in the 1860s. Colonia cheese is Uruguay’s only indigenous cheese, and 68% of all the country’s local cheese dairies are concentrated here and in neighbouring San José.

North: citrus, sugar and tobacco

Salto is citrus country: Valencia oranges, Murcott mandarins, lemons and grapefruit. Together with Paysandú, the region produces 90% of the country’s citrus exports: more than 150,000 tonnes a year worth US$79 million. When it is winter in Europe and the United States, it is summer here, so fruit is exported there as counter-seasonal produce.

In Paysandú, the Argentine group San Miguel opened the largest lemon factory in its history in 2024: 60,000 tonnes of lemons a year, essential oil, concentrate and dried peel.

Artigas is the country’s northernmost department. Sugar cane grows in the town of Bella Unión, the only place in Uruguay where it does. The ALUR complex makes sugar and bioethanol from it.

Rivera lives on tobacco. Nearly all Uruguayan tobacco is grown here. Burley and Virginia varieties are grown here, and Monte Paz, the only local producer, is now 145 years old.

East: rice and quiet pastures

Treinta y Tres harvests 29% of all national rice. There are irrigated fields, intensive farming and yields that surprise agronomists: in the 2022/23 season they reached 9.5 tonnes per hectare. The world average is about 4.7 t/ha.

Rocha provides another 23% of rice. The department is also notable for olive oil: production began growing here several years ago, and the Nuevo Manantial brand won silver at the New York International Olive Oil Competition in 2023.

Both departments have a strong livestock industry. Pastures near Laguna Merín are good, and beef goes for export.

Centre: milk and pulp

Florida produces 30% of national milk — 640 million litres a year. In 2023/24, the Conaprole cooperative processed 1.46 billion litres. Latin America’s largest dairy cooperative relies in large part on raw material from this region.

In 2023, Durazno and Tacuarembó became the setting for an event discussed here for years: the UPM Paso de los Toros plant opened, the largest industrial investment in the country’s history at US$3 billion. It has capacity for 2.1 million tonnes of pulp annually. By the end of 2024, pulp had taken first place in Uruguay’s exports: US$2.5 billion and 20% of all merchandise exports.

South: wine and olives

Canelones produces 62% of all Uruguayan wine. It has 82 bodegas and 66% of the country’s vineyards. Since a 2007 law, the city of Las Piedras has held the official title of ‘capital of grapes and wine’.

The country’s best-known wine is made in Maldonado. Bodega Garzón has 240 hectares on weathered granite 2.5 billion years old, one of the planet’s oldest rock formations. In 2018, Wine Enthusiast named it the New World’s best winery. Tannat, Albariño, Marselan. Colinas de Garzón olive oil is also made here and regularly wins prizes in international competitions.

A separate note on mate

Uruguay drinks more mate per person than anyone else in the world: 10 kg per person per year. By comparison, Argentina consumes 7 kg and Brazil 1 kg.

Yet the country barely produces yerba mate itself. All commercial mate is imported from Brazil — about US$50 million a year. The plant grows wild in the east of the country, in the hills of Rocha, Treinta y Tres and Rivera, but there are no industrial plantations. That is only true for now: parliament is debating a law that would declare yerba mate cultivation to be in the national interest.

Cattle

11.5 million head of cattle for 3.5 million people: three to four cows for every resident. 75% of the herd is Hereford and 20% Angus. Cattle farming exists everywhere, but is strongest in the east and north, on basalt soils.

75% of beef is exported. Uruguay is among the world’s top 10 exporters.

Uruguay feeds the world. Soy, rice, beef, wine, citrus and milk all go for export, and all are well known.

But a person stands behind every field: a farmer in Soriano who knows when to sow; a cheesemaker in Colonia whose family has made Queso Colonia for four generations; a rice grower in Treinta y Tres who can get 9.5 tonnes from a hectare where the world gets half that; the Maldonado winemakers who saw potential in granite 2.5 billion years old.

The land here is good. The climate is suitable. But land exists elsewhere too.

Uruguay became what it is because people here know how to work calmly, without fuss, and with respect for what they do. That is the country’s true wealth.