Rethinking Latin America’s rural shift

Julio A. Berdegué Ignacia Fernández Angela Penagos

Conference at the International Development Research Centre, Ottawa, Canada, April 12, 2017

Content

▶ Understanding societies at the rural-urban interface, and their structural transformation

▶ Large-scale impact: expanding opportunities and wellbeing

▶ The successful IDRC-Rimisp partnership

The focus of our conference:Societies at the rural-urbaninterface

Ingresar TituloRural? Urban? Both?

Ingresar TituloThe century of the (small and medium) cities

47%

58%59%

65% 65%

73%75%

80% 82%83%

91%

N AMERICA LAC OCEANIA S AFRICA E ASIA WORLD EUROPE W AFRICA S ASIA SE ASIA E AFRICA

Ru

ral +

Urb

an <

50

0k

(% o

f to

tal)

World’s population at the rural-urban interface

Ingresar TituloThe structural transformation as a driver of “rurbanization”

▶ 73% of the world’s population

▶ 85% of the global extreme poor

▶ The vast majority of the global extreme poor work in agriculture work, 42% on farms less than 1 hectare in size

▶ 99.6% of all land

▶ 82% of fresh water use

▶ 59% of greenhouse gases emissions

(Estimates: sources and assumptions available upon demand)

There is no hope of achieving the SDGs without engagingsocieties at the rural-urban interface

Ingresar título

An IDRC-sponsored quest for a new understanding of transformed societies at the rural-urban interface

Where do people live their lives?

7% of the population in “deep rural” green

43% of population in “rural-urban” yellow

50% of the population in “urban” red

Where do people live their lives?Where do people live their lives?

Where do people live their lives?Where do people live their lives?

Where do people live their lives?Where do people live their lives?

Where do people live their lives?Where do people live their lives?

19% of the population in “deep rural” green

32% of population in “rural-urban” yellow

49% of the population in “urban” red

Where do people live their lives?Where do people live their lives?

Where do people live their lives?Opportunities and wellbeing

Where do people live their lives?Opportunities and wellbeing

Urbanization

patterns

Changes in

agrifood systems

Changes in

labor markets

Three vectors of the transformation

CountryNon-farm rural employment, %

c. 1990 c. 2012 Change

Chile 31.5 53.2 69%

Bolivia 14.6 23.7 62%

Brazil 22.3 34.6 55%

Guatemala 28.5 43.0 51%

Uruguay 31.4 40.6 29%

Paraguay 36.6 47.2 29%

Mexico 50.1 64.6 29%

Colombia 42.2 53.0 26%

El Salvador 45.0 54.1 20%

Honduras 31.0 37.1 20%

Costa Rica 56.9 66.6 17%

Panama 44.2 50.3 14%

Ecuador 34.0 38.0 12%

Dominican Rep 58.8 65.3 11%

Peru 25.2 27.2 8%

Nicaragua 36.6 30.1 -18%

Where do people work?

Female

Manufacturing Electricity

Construction Commerce

Transportation Financial

Real estate Public administration

Social services Agriculture

Mining Other

Male

Manufacturing Electricity

Construction Commerce

Transportation Financial

Real estate Public administration

Social services Agriculture

Mining Other

Colombia, 2013, rural workers per sector

100

91

82

6764

35

100

111115

123

115

106100

104

9590

7275

0

20

40

60

80

100

120

1990 1998 2003 2006 2009 2013

Chile

Commercial farmers Farm workers Smallholders

Lineal (Commercial farmers) Lineal (Farm workers) Lineal (Smallholders)

How are smallholder farmers affected by this transformation?

▶ Economic autonomy: the ability of women to generate their own income and resources through remunerated work under conditions equal to those of men

▶ The effect of the territory on thedifferentiated ability of men and womento generate income, is statisticallysignificant

▶ Different territories offer different opportunities for expanding women’s economic autonomy – there is an interaction between spatial and gender inequalities, so that women in some territories are even more constrained than women in other places

Men and women are affected differently by the rural transformation

▶ The economic structure of different territories

▶ The spatial distribution of women’s assets

▶ Differences in the formal and informal institutions that characterize each territory

▶ Social actors agents present in the territory

Factors that explain the variation of gender inequalitiesacross territories

Bajo Cauca

region in the

Department

of Antioquia

▶ Greater importance of women’s employment in the services sector

▶ Economy in transition. This used to be a region much affected by the armed conflict, where the government has invested in economic development as a way of consolidating its presence.

▶ Well established traditional social norms favoring greater gender equality

▶ Women are well organized and have a well-established capacity to influence social change (e.g., Network of Women of the Bajo Cauca).

Cumbal

municipality

in the

Department

of Nariño

▶ Over 80% of the population is indigenous

▶ The local economy is largely agricultural, and offers few options for off-farm formal employment for women.

▶ Mostly informal jobs.

▶ Women value their indigenous culture as an economic asset

▶ Development programs supported by international agencies have strengthened the organizations of indigenous women. Greater understanding of their own responsibility and capacities to change their economic environment

Some territories do better in reducing the gender cap in economic autonomy

▶ Above and beyond of policies and programs to reduce the economic gender gap at the national, aggregate level, it is necessary to recognize that place-specific (territorial) strategies will be necessary

▶ National analyses of territorial development dynamics must measure and keep track of the evolution of gender gaps at the scale of territories, not only as national averages

▶ Territorial economic development initiatives should internalize how they will differentially affect men and women. For example, should we prefer strategy X which gives the highest rate of territorial economic growth, over strategy Y, if X does less than Y to reduce the gender gap in economic autonomy?

▶ Territorial development programs ought to prioritize public goods and services that reduce the opportunity cost of women in the formal, off-farm labor market (e.g., child care centres, care of senior citizens)

▶ Territorial development programs must invest in promoting women’s organization and collective action, in the economic and in the policy spheres

What can be done at the interaction between gender and territory to enhance women’s economic autonomy?

Expanding opportunities and enhancing wellbeing of people in societies at the rural-urban

▶ To promote transformation strategies for rural territories in Latin America, based on a deep understanding of their development dynamics and challenges.

Rimip’s mission

Territorial development in

the peace-building process

Territorial planning

Highlights of Rimisp policy engagement in Colombia

Source: DANE, DNP, 2015

VariablePostconflict

municipalities

Population 7,405,612

GDP (USD Million) 140

Share of agriculture in GDP (%) 16%

Share of extractive industries in GDP

(%)19%

Multidimensional poverty (%) 80%

Tax revenue in total municipal income

(%)10%

Source: Rimisp

Territorial development in the Colombian peace building process

Territorial Development Programs - PDET

Is an Institutional, social, economic and policy strategy, to promote

structural change in the most poor and neglected territories

Opportunities Equity Democracy

With the goal of providing

Effective citizenship Basis wellbeing standardsProtect pluri-ethnic and multicultural richness

Smallholder agricultureRegional development and

integrantion

Linked to the SDG framework

Territorial Development

Wh

ere

the

rura

l in

hab

itan

ts c

an:

▶ Building territorial peace requires regulating the access to and the use of space and the resources therein:

▶ 59% of rural households lack titles to their land.

▶ 55% of rural areas in conflict over land use and ecological capacity.

▶ 97% of existing municipal zoning plans do not include rural areas.

▶ More than 6.6 millions hectares and 5.7 million people, affected by forced displacement during the conflict – restitution a huge issue

Territorial Planning

Source: DANE, DNP, 2015

Source: Rimisp

VariableSelected

municipalities POT

Population7,367,242

(68,215)

GDP (USD million) 331

Share of agriculture in GDP

(%)15%

Share of extractive industries

in GDP (%)10%

Multidimensional poverty (%) 69%

Tax revenue in total municipal

income (%)14%

Territorial Planning

Conceptual and

methodological

guidelines

Technical

assistance

Innovations on

concepts and

processes

Local capacity

building

Monitoring and

follow-up system

Promote better conditions to exercise rural citizens’ rights

Recognize the rural – urban

interface

Contribute to rural poverty reduction and to closing the urban-rural gap

Foster rural development

Provide legal certaintyover land ownership to

avoid land dispossession

and stimulate investment

Resolve land use conflicts promoting

sustainable land-use planning

Outputs Challenges

Main outputs contribute to overcome rural planning challenges

With (more than) a little help from our friends

Network-building

▶ IDRC has been the most important partner of Rimisp

• A risk-taker that is willing to go beyond the comfort zone of well-

established issues and ideas

• Co-producing results and impact, by engaging in real, substantive

discussion and debate, above and beyond enforcing its accountability

obligations

• Long-term engagement necessary to achieve results and impacts that

are compatible with the magnitude of our challenges

• Investing in developing capacities of its partners and not only in the

work we do

Final remarks

Ready for 30 more years!

The following Rimisp partners and staff contributed to producing theresults shown in this presentation:

Julio A. Berdegué, Chiara Cazzuffi, Javier Escobal, Leopoldo Fergusson, Ignacia Fernández, Camila González, Tatiana Hiller, Ana María Ibañez,

Cristian Leyton, David López, Félix Modrego, Angela Penagos,Felicity Proctor, Juan Mauricio Ramírez, Eduardo Ramírez, Ivette Rapaport,

Thomas Reardon, Santiago Satizabal, Isidro Soloaga, Juan Soto, Andrés Tomaselli, Miguel Uribe, and Milena Vargas.

Rethinking Latin America’s rural shift

Ignacia Fernández – IFernandez@rimisp.org

Angela Penagos – APenagos@rimisp.org

Julio A Berdegué – JBerdegue@rimisp.org