Rural exodus is the process of migration of people from the countryside to the city. Many causes can be associated with it, such as the modernization of agricultural production, land concentration, the search for better living conditions and better jobs, among other factors.
Among its consequences are the the emptying of rural areas and the disorderly growth of cities. In Brazil, the rural exodus gained strength with industrialization and intensified between 1970 and 1980, when more than half of the population began to live in cities.
Read too: Causes and consequences of Venezuelan immigration to Brazil
What is rural exodus?
The rural exodus is a migration process that takes place when people leave thethe field and move to the city. As the term itself suggests, it is an emigration process and necessarily happens in the direction from rural to urban.
What are the causes of the rural exodus?
The departure of a large number of people from rural areas towards urban centers
can occur spontaneously or forced, in the same way as with migrations in general. The reasons that lead to this displacement are diverse, being associated with the productive restructuring of a given territory - therefore, a factor structural –, the economic situation or particular financial issues and even natural conditions (natural disasters, severe droughts and others).The main cause of the rural exodus is the modernization of the production process in the field. With the advent of green revolution in the mid-twentieth century, a large number of new technologies were incorporated into agricultural production chains, which conditioned the transformation of the employed labor profile, which started to demand greater qualification and also the replacement of jobs by machinery. As a result, many people who lost their jobs emigrated to urban centers in search of jobs and a fresh start.
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THE land concentration it is another reason for the emigration of people from the countryside. It is one of the oldest structural problems in Brazil and is defined as the possession of large tracts of land by a small number of owners. These areas are commonly used for planting monocultures destined for export. Many small and medium landowners who are unable to incorporate the productive model of the agribusiness they end up selling or renting their properties to large landowners, moving to the cities.
O industrialization process became an attractive for people living in rural areas, representing a life-changing opportunity. THE search for better conditions understands the reasons why the rural exodus happens, and it's not just a financial issue, but also of access to basic services, which often do not cover the rural area, such as sanitation and hospitals. However, the scenario that these individuals find in cities is not always the most favorable.
Read too: What is the relationship between industrialization and urbanization?
Characteristics of rural exodus
The rural exodus can be classified as a type of migration we call emigration, as it represents an outgoing movement of people from one location to another. In this specific case, the place of departure is the countryside, and the place of arrival is the urban area or city. The change that this process refers to is definitive, and the causes linked to it can be very varied, as we saw earlier.
Migration between countryside and city can occur in any country (developed and underdeveloped) and at any time, regardless of the local economic or political situation. It is really, a very common movement and that it has always been present in the formation and development of national territories. What many of them have in common, moreover, are the consequences that the large influx of people can bring to urban space.
What are the consequences of the rural exodus?
The rural exodus has consequences both for the urban environment, where the migratory stream goes, and for the rural environment, where it leaves. This movement results in a gradual process of field emptying, which is nothing more than a considerable decline in the rural population. In addition, the intensification of land concentration for the acquisition of the lands that were left by the emigrants.
The population contingent that starts to enter cities can cause the phenomenon called urban macrocephaly, which is the rapid and disorderly growth of urban areas. The problems generated are well known and are felt by people and observed in space. Are they:
increase in poverty, due to the scarcity of jobs and the low professional qualification of those who arrive in the city;
increase in the number of people working in the informal market;
urban pollution;
health problems arising from lack of sanitation;
growing number of informal and risky housing (slums).
Of the effects listed above, most of them could be solved through proper urban planning.
rural exodus in Brazil
The process of rural exodus in Brazilian territory gained strength with the beginning of industrialization, which began in the 1930s and intensified 20 years later, when new productive sectors entered the country. In the interval between 1950 and 1970, the urban growth rate jumped from 3.91% per year to 5.22%, the highest value between the 1950s and the 2000s. The growth rate of the rural area, however, declined at the same speed and reached negative levels in 1980, when it registered - 0.62%, which shows the decrease in the population that lived in the countryside. The information is from the IBGE.
O Brazil became an urbanized country in the 1970s, when 55.98% of the population lived in cities. This amount rose to 67.7% in the following decade and, currently, is almost 85%, according to the IBGE. The formation of the Concentrated Region in the Southeast and South of Brazil and the process of conservative modernization of the field combined with the expansion of agricultural frontiers, based on the agribusiness model, are factors that conditioned the acceleration of the departure of people from the countryside to the cities between the 1970s and 1980s.
Emigration from the countryside to the city has not stopped, but it is happening at much more modest rates than in past decades.
solved exercises
Question 1 - (And either)
Text I
By emancipating themselves from manorial tutelage, many peasants were legally disconnected from the old land. They should pay, to acquire property or lease. Because they do not have resources, they have swelled the growing layer of newsboys and mobile workers, others, even though they owned a small lot, supplemented their existence with wages. sporadic.
AX, P. P. Politics and colonization in the Empire. Porto Alegre: EdUFRGS, 1999 (adapted).
Text II
With the globalization of the economy, the hegemony of the agricultural development model has expanded, with its technological standards, characterizing agribusiness. This new face of capitalist agriculture has also changed the way in which land is controlled and exploited. Thus, the occupation of arable areas was expanded and agricultural frontiers were extended.
SADER, E.; JINKINGS, I. Contemporary Encyclopedia of Latin America and the Caribbean. São Paulo: Boitempo, 2006 (adapted).
The texts demonstrate that both in nineteenth-century Europe and in the Latin American context of the 21st century, technological changes experienced in the countryside interfere in the lives of local populations, because:
A) they induce young people to study in large cities, causing rural exodus, once they graduate, they do not return to their region of origin.
B) encourage local populations to seek lines of state financing with the aim of expanding family farming, ensuring its settlement in the countryside.
C) expand the role of the State, enabling rural economic groups to produce and impose agricultural policies, expanding their control over markets.
D) they increase the production and productivity of certain crops due to the intensification of mechanization, the use of pesticides and the cultivation of transgenic plants.
E) disorganize the traditional way of life, driving them to search for better conditions in the urban space or in other countries in often precarious situations.
Resolution
Alternative E. The modernization of the countryside displaces a large population towards urban centers in search of for jobs, better wages and better living conditions, but their expectations are not always hit.
Question 2 - (UFPB) Brazilian urbanization intensified from the 1960s onwards, reaching more than 85% in the last demographic census carried out in 2010. On the other hand, the rural population has been falling with each demographic census carried out, and Brazil becomes increasingly urban and less rural.
Based on this information and the literature on the subject, identify the correct statements:
I. Essential services, such as schools and hospitals, are concentrated in the urban area, contributing to the rural exodus and the swell of cities.
II. The rural exodus has been increasing lately, implying the lack of labor in the countryside and the consequent decrease in Brazilian agricultural production.
III. The mechanization of agriculture is homogeneous in all regions of Brazil, implying a rural exodus and consequent urbanization.
IV. Brazilian cities, in general, are not prepared to receive a large contingent of population rural, resulting in the lack and scarcity of basic services such as school, housing and beds hospitals.
Only the statements are correct:
A) I and II.
B) I and IV.
C) I, II and III.
D) I, II and IV.
E) I, III and IV.
Resolution
Alternative B. Only statements I and IV provide true information. One of the causes of the rural exodus is the search for services that do not cover rural areas. With the intensification of the entry of people into cities, there is the occurrence of urban macrocephaly, which portrays the lack of structure and planning in cities.
By Paloma Guitarrara
Geography teacher