Population, territory and sustainable development

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Rodríguez and Villa (1998) state that “in demographic terms, the increase in the share of national
and urban population of metropolises seems only to have been possible by virtue of the high levels of
positive migration seen in the cities that became metropolises.” Indeed, studies show that fertility rates
first began to decline in the region’s large cities, which meant that natural population growth in these
metropolises was slower than the national and urban rates. Accordingly, the high overall growth rates
seen in the first three decades of the period of study can be attributed to the effects of migration (see
table X.2). The authors comment that in the 1950s and 1960s, migration was a key driver of growth in
cities like Bogota, Caracas and São Paulo (4%), Rio de Janeiro (2.6%), Buenos Aires and Mexico City
(2%) and Santiago (1.7%). The migration effect eased in the 1970s and tapered further in the 1980s. The
authors also point out that data for the 1990s show that net migration rates fell sharply in all metropolises.
More recent studies (Rodríguez, 2004 and 2009; Guzmán and others, 2006) show that the most
populous urban agglomerations (Mexico City and São Paulo) sustained net emigration between 1980 and
1990. This factor, coupled with the demographic shift under way, resulted in a sharp decline in the growth
rate of that class of city. This trend of waning strength as a magnet for migration and net negative
migration was observed exclusively in the largest cities (Mexico City, Río de Janeiro, São Paulo and
Santiago), which only partly validates the hypothesis that metropolises have lost their draw. However,
data from the 2000 censuses confirm the hypothesis, showing that metropolises are more likely to lose
population; indeed, the census data show that São Paulo, Mexico City and Santiago experienced net
emigration. Thus, their loss of attractiveness would appear to be real, although not necessarily continuous.
An analysis of the Spatial distribution and urbanization in Latin America and the Caribbean
(DEPUALC) database points up considerable diversity among large cities, and given the number of urban
centres that fall under this category, it is hard to give an overview of their demographic characteristics
(Rodríguez and Villa, 1998). However, in 2000 there were 39 metropolitan agglomerations with a
population of between 1 and 4 million, comprising different types of cities (see table X.5): (i) capital
cities (Caracas, Havana, Guatemala City, Santo Domingo, Port-au-Prince, Asunción, Montevideo, La Paz,
Quito, Panama City, San Salvador and San José); (ii) large cities in border areas or regions with
historically small populations (Porto Alegre, Brasilia, Belém and Manaos in Brazil, and Ciudad Juárez
and Tijuana in Mexico); and (iii) cities with strong economic growth (Curitiba, Guayaquil, Guadalajara,
Monterrey, Puebla, Maracaibo, Porto Alegre, Recife, Salvador da Bahia and Fortaleza).
Table X.5
LATIN AMERICA: POPULATION AND GROWTH RATE OF CITIES WITH 1 MILLION TO 4
MILLION INHABITANTS, BY NUMBER OF CITIES, 1950-2000
Cities with 1 million-4 million
inhabitants
1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000
Number of cities 1 3 11 18 29 39
Total population 1 223 899 3 764 344 15 741 378 29 525 217 48 789 940 73 268 132
1950-1960 1960-1970 1970-1980 1980-1990 1990-2000 1950-2000
Growth rate 11.2% 14.3% 6.3% 5.0% 4.0% 8.2%
Source: Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), on the basis of Spatial distribution and
urbanization in Latin America and the Caribbean (DEPUALC) database, 2009.