Population mobility, environmental sustainability and social vulnerability

Abstract

This article reviews research on population and environment, with particular emphasis on the Brazilian case. Attention is focused on the relations between patterns of population mobility and environmental change. With mortality and fertility rates already having experienced major transitions and now experiencing slower change, migration becomes the central factor in population change and its impacts on the environment. In the long term, this is the variable which will always inspire concern. Although the major internal migration in the second half of the 20th century (rural-urban and inter-regional) has slowed considerably, intra-regional moves continue to be important. Other mobility processes,especially commuting and tourism, also affect the integrity of natural resources and must be continually evaluated. Ecological-economic zoning, and its impacts on population movements, will be a basic requirement of the 21st century.