The Columbian Exchange refers to the trade of diseases, culture, ideas, food, human populations, and crops between the Old World and the New World after the journey to the New World by Christopher Columbus in 1492 (Nunn & Qian 2010). All these items are still used today in modern society. The Columbian Exchange brought numerous changes including, social, biological, intellectual and financial changes. The Columbian Exchange helped the Old World in numerous ways, for example, discoveries and supplies of metals. It also introduced new staple crops like potatoes, maizes, and cassava etc. When it comes to foods, it brought many new food items that have an increased amount of calories, like tomatoes, pineapple, tomato, chilli pepper, and peanuts etc. The tobacco crop was so globally accepted that countries started to use it as a currency substitute. The exchange also significantly enhanced the quantity of numerous Old World crops like coffee and sugar etc. These crops were suitable enough for the soil in the New World. The exchange also brought some negative impacts like diseases etc (Nunn & Qian 2010). The reason to call the Columbian encounter the Columbian Exchange was the changes that happened after the appearance of Europeans in America. The term Columbian Exchange is also coined after the name of Christopher Columbus, who is thought as the first person to come to America in 1492. In this paper, the Columbian Exchange is explained based on the analysis of Crosby's book. The paper specifically explores how Tobacco affected both worlds from 1492 until the 20th century as an example of the Columbian Exchange. In the end, the paper concludes the findings related to the Columbian Exchange.
Alfred W. Crosby in his book "The Columbian Exchange: Biological and Cultural Consequences of 1492" coined the term Columbian Exchange for the first time. The book consists of six essays. Crosby in his book mainly argued that most important and influenti...