Yesterday I met with an Irish expat who made an amazing comparison and prediction for Uruguay as a potential New Ireland of the southern hemisphere

More or less the same living conditions as Ireland back to the 1970's and Uruguay of today:

1. No big natural resources such as oil, diamonds or precious metals.

2. Approximately the same population.

3. A very highly Educated population. Many people with higher education degrees.

4. A high number of emigres. Especially young population.

He said that the Irish miracle happened as a hit-back of the returning emigres. Many of these had spread for countries like Japan, the US and other non-EU countries.

Once the little country, he mention that Ireland was even poorer than countries like Spain or Greece back-then, joined the European Community, many international companies saw in Ireland a perfect place to open offices within what now is the EU for the skilled people, the low taxes for investment, the cheap prices and the geo-political place of Ireland. Ireland had the best qualification.

He quoted "you young guy may not believe me, but this (Uruguay) is a land with enormous potential and prosperous future just like Ireland when I left (to the UK)". He said to me, "you will see the miracle happen in your land."

He predicted that because the Uruguayan population is so educated, skilled but humble and low-profile the perfect recipe for the miracle to happen.

Being in a strategic place is a huge advantage. And that's one of the reasons Uruguay became an independent territory from (what's now) Argentina and Brazil. A geo-political move in the region to avoid a big war between them.

We see it in the culture, Uruguay is a mixture between Spanish speaking Argentina and Brazil, as already described in another article a dialect of Spanish-Portuguese " Portuñol" and Portuguese are spoken in norther Uruguay.