Rural territories lag significantly in areas of healthcare, education and employment opportunities

Mexico City, April 24, 2012 - Latin America has the highest inequality in the world, and nowhere is this more evident than in the poorest rural territories in the region, according to the “Poverty and Inequality 2011: Latin America Report” released today in Mexico City by RIMISP – Latin American Center for Rural Development.

In Mexico for instance, nearly 60 per cent of the nation’s extreme poverty is concentrated in rural areas, according to the report, and the rural illiteracy rate is 15.6 per cent, while it’s only 4.3 per cent in urban areas.

Latin America’s poorest rural territories also have limited access to healthcare. In Mexico’s Mixtla de Altamirano Municipality, 700 of every 1000 live-born babies will die in their first year of life, according to the report. In 530 other municipalities across the country, the rate is less than 1 in 1000, and the national average is 17.6 children in every 1000.

The report – made possible through funding from the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) and the International Development Research Centre - Canada (IDRC) – highlights the causes of extreme inequality, territorial achievement gaps and lack of opportunities in Latin America’s rural sector, analysing socio-economic indicators in health, education, economic dynamism and employment, income and poverty, citizen security, and gender equality from 10 Latin American countries, including Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico, Nicaragua and Peru.

The in-depth study paints a picture of a region of extreme haves and have-nots, of nuanced territorial differences – even within the rural sector – and of failed and successful national policies for rural poverty reduction that have both contributed to overall poverty reduction and – in some cases – exacerbated the issue.

“Overall much of Latin America is making solid advances in reducing extreme poverty and closing the inequality gap,” said Josefina Stubbs, Director of IFAD’s Operations in Latin America and the Caribbean. “Nevertheless, much work needs to be done in closing these gaps and in creating dynamic public policies.”

According to the report’s analysis, Mexico’s public policies of the last 20 years have actually served to increase poverty and inequality in rural Mexico. For example, in Mexico’s ten richest municipalities, the average per capita earnings are around US$32,000, while in the poorest they are just US$603 per year.

“When we see, for example, that the average GDP per capita of the richest municipalities is 50 times higher than that of the poorest, we need to ask ourselves how we are distributing the wealth of our country,” said José Antonio Mendoza, Technical Secretary of the Rural Dialogue Group, an IFAD- and RIMISP-backed programme that is bringing top-thinkers from Latin America together to discuss issues of poverty and inequality across the region.

According to Mendoza, the figures from the Latin America Report “harshly illustrate the extensive territorial inequalities that relegate many of our compatriots from the rural areas and future generations to a life of deficiencies and lack of opportunities. We hope that this study will be a tool for decision makers in the design of solutions and public policies for development in rural Mexico.”

Territorial Development
The study also reveals two noteworthy challenges that concentrate differently on the urban and rural territorial level. Urban areas in the region are primarily facing challenges of inequality, security and economic dynamism, according to the report, while rural areas show lags in access to services and basic rights such as health and education. Gender equality is also a major issue in rural territories. And the poorest territories are often those with the highest concentrations of indigenous and afro-descendent peoples. 

“In the case of Mexico, the study recognizes that the differences started growing decades ago, and in the countryside there are still extreme territorial inequalities between the states of the north and the south, and between subsistence and commercial producers,” said Stubbs. “The first step in confronting this issue is to empower small-scale producers and rural entrepreneurs to take the reigns of their own destiny and transform family agriculture into a profitable and sustainable business.”

The Latin American Report shows how some social indicators and policies that are managed on a national level may not take into account the large differences that exist between territories and regional contexts. In Mexico, for example, the highest level of spending on rural development programmes is concentrated in the richest states. 

“The fact that there are large economic and social gaps in Mexico between the rural and urban sector – and within the rural sector itself – illustrates the differentiated models of economic development that have not been rectified in our nation,” said Mendoza. “This makes it even more urgent a third generation of reforms that target these efforts in an effective manner, decentralize poverty reduction social programmes, and reduce the gaps that separate the north and south of the republic.”

Notes to Editors
The “Poverty and Inequality 2011: Latin America Report” is available online at informelatinoamericano website and IFAD website.

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Press release No.: IFAD/30/2012

The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) works with poor rural people to enable them to grow and sell more food, increase their incomes and determine the direction of their own lives. Since 1978, IFAD has invested almost US$14 billion in grants and low-interest loans to developing countries through projects empowering about 400 million people to break out of poverty, thereby helping to create vibrant rural communities. IFAD is an international financial institution and a specialized UN agency based in Rome – the United Nations’ food and agriculture hub. It is a unique partnership of 168 members from the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), other developing countries and the Organisation for Economic Co‑operation and Development (OECD).

Rimisp – Latin American Center for Rural Development is a regional non-profit organisation set up in 1986 with the goal of supporting processes of institutional change, productive transformation, and capacity building for the various stakeholders and social groups comprising rural Latin American societies.