Campo Grande

Campo Grande

Located in the mid-western region of Brazil, Campo Grande is the capital and largest city of the state of Mato Grosso do Sul. The city is nicknamed Cidade Morena, which means "Swarthy City" in Portuguese, a name given to the city because of the reddish-brown color of the region's soil. It started out as a small village founded in 1877 by José Antônio Pereira and Manoel Vieira de Sousa, farmers from Minas Gerais, just after the end of the war in Paraguay. The city began to develop quite rapidly due to its privileged climate and location. These attracted people from other regions of the country, particularly the south, south-east and north-east. The flora of Campo Grande and Central Brazil is a tropical savannah known as the "Cerrado", which ranges from pure grasslands to an almost closed canopy of medium height trees. The 1960s began the growth of large-scale agriculture in the Cerrado area. Today, the state is one of the world's largest soybean producers. The municipality is home to the 178-hectare Matas do Segredo State Park, established in 2000 to protect the cerrado forest. It is also home to the 135-hectare Prosa State Park, created in 2002.