Latin America: Where urbanization and poverty peak together with biodiversity?

Latin America is a region that houses many of the global biodiversity hotspots. Latin American countries are also well known for their social inequality and poverty. Simultaneously, most countries within the region concentrate their population within urban centers. Actually, among the five most popu...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Sanchez-Sarria, Camilo E., Bonilla-Moheno, Martha, Vázquez, Luis-Bernardo, MacGregor-Fors, Ian
Formato: Capítulo de libro
Lenguaje:Inglés
Publicado: Springer 2025
Acceso en línea:https://hdl.handle.net/10568/177055
_version_ 1855519148420890624
author Sanchez-Sarria, Camilo E.
Bonilla-Moheno, Martha
Vázquez, Luis-Bernardo
MacGregor-Fors, Ian
author_browse Bonilla-Moheno, Martha
MacGregor-Fors, Ian
Sanchez-Sarria, Camilo E.
Vázquez, Luis-Bernardo
author_facet Sanchez-Sarria, Camilo E.
Bonilla-Moheno, Martha
Vázquez, Luis-Bernardo
MacGregor-Fors, Ian
author_sort Sanchez-Sarria, Camilo E.
collection Repository of Agricultural Research Outputs (CGSpace)
description Latin America is a region that houses many of the global biodiversity hotspots. Latin American countries are also well known for their social inequality and poverty. Simultaneously, most countries within the region concentrate their population within urban centers. Actually, among the five most populated global megacities, two are Latin American. In this chapter, we describe the region’s history of urbanization and socio-economy, examine the urban–biodiversity relationships that prevail in cities, and dissect the relationship that exists between the countries’ urbanization, their poverty levels, and their biodiversity (considering bird diversity as a proxy). For practical matters, we focused on major Latin American countries (>3 million people) for which official data are available. Our results show that Latin America is a biodiverse and socio-economically complex region, but it is also heterogeneous. Some countries showed to be tightly linked to one or two of the assessed variables, while others lied in intermediate values. For instance, some countries positively associated with urbanization but not with poverty or biodiversity (e.g., Chile, Uruguay), others related with high urbanization and poverty values (e.g., Puerto Rico, El Salvador), others with high poverty (e.g., Guatemala, Honduras), or high biodiversity (e.g., Peru, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Bolivia). Thus, our results do not only highlight the peculiarities of each country but the heterogeneous reality of these relationships across the region.
format Book Chapter
id CGSpace177055
institution CGIAR Consortium
language Inglés
publishDate 2025
publishDateRange 2025
publishDateSort 2025
publisher Springer
publisherStr Springer
record_format dspace
spelling CGSpace1770552025-12-08T10:29:22Z Latin America: Where urbanization and poverty peak together with biodiversity? Sanchez-Sarria, Camilo E. Bonilla-Moheno, Martha Vázquez, Luis-Bernardo MacGregor-Fors, Ian Latin America is a region that houses many of the global biodiversity hotspots. Latin American countries are also well known for their social inequality and poverty. Simultaneously, most countries within the region concentrate their population within urban centers. Actually, among the five most populated global megacities, two are Latin American. In this chapter, we describe the region’s history of urbanization and socio-economy, examine the urban–biodiversity relationships that prevail in cities, and dissect the relationship that exists between the countries’ urbanization, their poverty levels, and their biodiversity (considering bird diversity as a proxy). For practical matters, we focused on major Latin American countries (>3 million people) for which official data are available. Our results show that Latin America is a biodiverse and socio-economically complex region, but it is also heterogeneous. Some countries showed to be tightly linked to one or two of the assessed variables, while others lied in intermediate values. For instance, some countries positively associated with urbanization but not with poverty or biodiversity (e.g., Chile, Uruguay), others related with high urbanization and poverty values (e.g., Puerto Rico, El Salvador), others with high poverty (e.g., Guatemala, Honduras), or high biodiversity (e.g., Peru, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Bolivia). Thus, our results do not only highlight the peculiarities of each country but the heterogeneous reality of these relationships across the region. 2025-04-16 2025-10-14T09:41:43Z 2025-10-14T09:41:43Z Book Chapter https://hdl.handle.net/10568/177055 en Limited Access Springer Sanchez-Sarria, C.E.; Bonilla-Moheno, M.; Vázquez, L.; MacGregor-Fors, I. (2025) Latin America: Where urbanization and poverty peak together with biodiversity?. In: Angeoletto, F.; Tryjanowski, P.; Fellowes, Mark D. E. Ecology of Tropical Cities, Volume I: Natural and Social Sciences Applied to the Conservation of Urban Biodiversity. Springer, Online first paper(2025-04-16). 1: p. 77-89. ISBN: 978-3-031-48011-9
spellingShingle Sanchez-Sarria, Camilo E.
Bonilla-Moheno, Martha
Vázquez, Luis-Bernardo
MacGregor-Fors, Ian
Latin America: Where urbanization and poverty peak together with biodiversity?
title Latin America: Where urbanization and poverty peak together with biodiversity?
title_full Latin America: Where urbanization and poverty peak together with biodiversity?
title_fullStr Latin America: Where urbanization and poverty peak together with biodiversity?
title_full_unstemmed Latin America: Where urbanization and poverty peak together with biodiversity?
title_short Latin America: Where urbanization and poverty peak together with biodiversity?
title_sort latin america where urbanization and poverty peak together with biodiversity
url https://hdl.handle.net/10568/177055
work_keys_str_mv AT sanchezsarriacamiloe latinamericawhereurbanizationandpovertypeaktogetherwithbiodiversity
AT bonillamohenomartha latinamericawhereurbanizationandpovertypeaktogetherwithbiodiversity
AT vazquezluisbernardo latinamericawhereurbanizationandpovertypeaktogetherwithbiodiversity
AT macgregorforsian latinamericawhereurbanizationandpovertypeaktogetherwithbiodiversity