GEO-6 Regional Assessment for Latin America and the Caribbean
the rate of urbanization is fastest in the Caribbean where 62 per cent of the population resided in urban areas at the start of the millennium, increasing to 70 per cent in 2015 and projected to reach 74 per cent in 2025 (UNDESA 2014).
The population of megacities in the region has grown from 59.2 million in 2000 to 66.4 million in 2015 and is projected to keep growing, reaching 76.1 million people in 2025. However, the share of the total population living in megacities has remained fairly stable at between 11.1 per cent and 11.2 per cent during 2000-2015. The percentage of the total population of LAC living in megacities is projected to fall marginally to 11 per cent in 2025 (UNDESA 2014). Despite the rapid rural to urban migration and the living conditions of many urban citizens, studies have shown that in Latin America, unlike North America for example, there is no difference in life satisfaction between residents of urban and rural areas (Valente and Berry 2016).
Although approximately 250 million urban citizens in LAC live in cities with more than 200 000 inhabitants, an important percentage live in small and medium sized cities, which receive much less attention and resources but face the same environmental challenges, are growing at faster rates and are absorbing most urban population growth (Libertun de Duren and Guerrero Compeán 2015). This has important governance implications that will be described in Chapter 3 of this report.
The urban growth described above has not been
accompanied with adequate urban planning, especially in small and medium sized cities. As shown in Chapter 2, this concentration of population with lack of adequate planning, coupled with low or non-existent water treatment facilities and inadequate solid waste treatment has been placing increasing pressure on ecosystems, particularly on urban freshwater ecosystems and coastal areas.
The absolute number of people living in slums has remained hard to reduce, but the percentage of the total urban
Table 1.3.2: Urban and rural population distribution and projections (at midyear, in millions).
2000 (% of
population) LAC
Urban Rural
Caribbean Urban Rural
Mesoamerica Urban Rural
South America Urban Rural
Source: UNDESA 2014 22 526
396 (75 %) 130 (25 %) 39
24 (62 %) 15 (38 % 139
96 (69 %) 43 (31 %) 349
277 (79 %) 72 (21 %)
2005 (% of
population) 563
433 (77 %) 130 (23 %) 40
26 (65 %) 14 (35 %) 150
106 (71 %) 44 (29 %) 372
301 (81 %) 71 (19 %)
2010 (% of
population) 597
468 (78 %) 129 (22 %) 42
28 (67 %) 14 (33 %) 161
116 (72 %) 45 (28 %) 394
324 (82 %) 70 (18 %)
2015 (% of
population) 630
503 (80 %) 127 (20 %) 43
30 (70 %) 13 (30 %) 172
127 (74 %) 45 (26 %) 415
346 (83 %) 69 (17 %)
2020 (% of
population) 662
536 (81 %) 126 (19 %) 44
32 (73 %) 12 (27 %) 182
137 (75 %) 45 (25 %) 434
366 (84 %) 68 (16 %)
2025 (% of
population) 691
567 (82 %) 124 (18 %) 46
34 (74 %) 12 (26 %) 193
148 (77 %) 45 (23 %) 452
385 (85 %) 67 (15 %)
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