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The natural resources of Latin America and the Caribbean are being subjected to increasing pressure and progressively more intense exploitation as a result of high population growth rates. This is manifested by constant increases in the demands for food, fuel and construction materials, by increased poverty in rural areas, by migration into urban areas and ever more marginal zones of fragile soils, and by increasingly strained institutional support.
In the last 30 years the population of the region has doubled to 480 million and it will again double in the next 50 years if the present growth rate continues. A stabilized population of 1100 million is expected by the year 2100; however, to achieve an appreciable increase in living standards, food production will have to more than double.
These events have caused serious degradation of the natural resources and loss of productivity in more than 306 million hectares in the region due to soil erosion, acidification, loss of organic matter, compaction, nutrient impoverishment and salinization. In the drylands some 79 million hectares are threatened by desertification, caused mainly by human actions through overgrazing, overexploitation of vegetation for domestic use, deforestation and inappropriate irrigation methods. Thus the lives of millions of people are affected and the future development of large parts of the region is at stake.
It is estimated that the region's cultivable land could expand from the present 171 million hectares to 736 million hectares. However, the greater part of the potentially cultivable land is of marginal quality and its utilization would entail high social, economic and environmental risks.
Landscape typical of desertification problems
Other lands that are not being used for arable cultivation are covered by tropical forests, but their conservation is of vital importance in order to maintain the global ecological stability and reduce the problems of global warming and loss of biodiversity.
Degraded landscape due to overgrazing
Scarcely 4 percent of cultivable lands are under irrigation, yet they produce approximately a third of the region's food supplies. This illustrates the tremendous potential of irrigation, but there are only limited possibilities for expanding the irrigated areas. Furthermore, the competition for water among agriculture, domestic consumption and industry is becoming ever stronger.
The rate of urbanization in the region has reached unprecedented proportions. Urban areas not only suffer from pollution but also compete with agriculture for land and water supplies. Thus, land-use planning at a national scale is urgently required, so that land can be assigned to different uses according to users' needs and the suitability of the land.
With the growing concern about environmental degradation, desertification and loss of biodiversity, the term 'sustainable land use' has become a common phrase enthusiastically welcomed by governments, scientists and planners. However, sustainable land use can only be achieved once the problems of land degradation and desertification are overcome and the land is used and managed in a way that is socially and economically acceptable to all sectors of society and does not cause environmental deterioration.
