Population, territory and sustainable development

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connections; (ii) identify the population hubs (urban or rural) most accessible to a scattered populace and
concentrate the supply of basic services there; (iii) use various procedures to serve a scattered population
in situ; (iv) reach the population directly even if it is scattered —one example, while not free from
problems or debate, is the conditional transfer programmes that started in rural areas and whose poverty
reduction impact has been substantial; (v) facilitate commuting (daily or for longer periods) from urban
centers for an array of reasons (employment, education, health and administrative, to name a few);
(vi) improve connectivity via placement of roads and railways and other connection infrastructure; and
(vii) facilitate virtual connectivity using information and communications technologies. In any event, all
these measures speak to the core tenet that, regardless of place of residence, the population has rights,
including access to basic services, and that the State should guarantee fulfilment of these rights.
Since the late 1990s and the early twenty-first century, the debate over the new rurality is coupled
with a territorial approach to rural development. According to this approach, which has important
repercussions for defining public policy (by making territory a policy matter), rural development is at the
core of sectoral policies in territorial spaces and these policies should be applied differently depending on
the context. Multidimensional space (economic, social, political, environmental and cultural) defines the
territorial approach, so policies provide strategic guidance for traditional rural and sector development
instruments and focus on the impact on redistribution, economic growth, preservation of social and
natural resources and social and territorial integration. This approach has been considered in several
countries of the region (Brazil, Ecuador, Guatemala and Mexico) because it has become a democratizing
force by harnessing territory-based policies and programmes, effective participation by organized civil
society, decentralization and the strengthening of local governments and the adoption of cultural identity
as the glue that holds territories together.
Box XI.2 looks at the experience of Brazil, Guatemala and Mexico in implementing rural
development policies with a territorial approach and cites examples of its being written into legislation or
policies. Not all of the countries of the region have incorporated this approach, although many have
promoted policies geared towards rural development and fighting poverty. Governments agree that
sustainable development of rural areas and agriculture is essential for achieving their public policy goals
and for successful modernization strategies. These policies complement economic growth and social
development goals in each country and can boost efforts to achieve the Millennium Development Goals.
Chapter V deals with territories (often but not always rural) with marked historical, analytical and
policy characteristics. These low population density areas make up a large part of the territory of the
region and are crucial for sustainable development worldwide. The report classes them in several general
groups that are related in very different ways to population dynamics and sustainable development:
(i) rainforest, with an indigenous population and resources that have historically sparked the interest of an
array of actors and been occupied gradually by spontaneous, disorganized advance parties or official
settlement programmes (nowadays virtually nonexistent, as explained in chapter V); (ii) desert and steppe
areas, by definition hostile to human settlement but populated on and off with the rise and fall of their
natural resources, which are usually extractive; and (iii) coastal areas that until recently were barely
inhabited but have been “discovered” by the global tourism industry, which is using them in different
ways (invasive mega-projects, permanent urbanization, isolated and exclusive locations, and microprojects
based on local actors and ecotourism, among others) .