Recent research has suggested that Asians from the early
Portuguese Eastern Empire, known as
Luso-Asians first came to Brazil during the sixteenth century as seamen known as
Lascars, or as servants, slaves and
concubines accompanying the governors, merchants and clergy who has served in Portuguese Asia. The first substantial Asian immigration to Brazil were a small number of
Chinese people (3,000) during the colonial period as
coolie slaves. Later waves of Chinese immigrants would come from Hong Kong and
Macau, the latter being a former Portuguese colony, as well as China's
ethnic Russian community during the 1950s. Later, significant immigration from Asia to Brazil would start in the late 19th century, when immigration from
Lebanon and
Syria became important. Until 1922,
Levantine immigrants were considered "Turks", as they carried passports issued by the Turkish
Ottoman Empire, which then ruled over present-day
Lebanon. Various estimates for Lebanese ancestry in Brazil place them at about 7 million. Another important Asian immigrant group to Brazil were from
Japan. The first
Japanese immigrants arrived in Brazil in 1908. Until the 1950s, more than 250 thousand Japanese immigrated to Brazil. Currently, the
Japanese-Brazilian population is estimated at 2.1 million people. It is the largest
ethnic Japanese population outside Japan, followed closely by the
Japanese community in the United States. Other East Asian groups are also significant in Brazil. The
Korean Brazilian population is estimated to be 70,000, and the
Chinese Brazilian population around 250,000. Over 70% of Asian Brazilians are concentrated in the state of
São Paulo. There are significant populations in
Paraná,
Pará,
Mato Grosso do Sul, and other parts of Brazil.
Japanese in Brazil used in
Japan to attract immigrants to
Brazil Restrictions on Asian immigrants Although discussions were situated in a theoretical field, immigrants arrived and colonies were founded through all this period (the rule of
Pedro II), especially from 1850 on, particularly in the
Southeast and
Southern Brazil. These discussions culminated in the Decree 528 in 1890, signed by Brazil's first President
Deodoro da Fonseca, which opened the national harbors to immigration except for Africans and Asians. This decree remained valid until 5 October 1892 when, due to pressures of coffee planters interested in cheap manpower, it was overturned by Law 97, which allowed the entry of
Japanese immigrants to work on the coffee plantations, as until then, Brazilian immigration was almost exclusively from Europe. ==See also==