GEO Brasil - UNEP

Within the decentralisation issue lies the perception, ever
more conscious and politically recognised, of the enormous
dimension of economic development. This perception,
therefore, includes the inherent characteristics of each space
as determinant elements elements of the reduction or
increase of differences among the regions and their diverse
social groups.
The mentioned process of decentralisation of political
management of the territory, when accompanied by the
necessary spatial concentration of economic activities
enables the gradual consolidation of a new territorial
dynamic and of sub-spaces thus configured in the less
industrialised regional economies. In this context, once
more, new challenges are presented by the growing alliance
of regional economies with the international, commercial
and financial circuits. These alliances are stimulated by
world globalisation phenomena and by the formation of
international blocs and result in a new territorial
fragmentation within national boundaries. A return to the
“archipelago”, an image frequently used in order to
characterise the Brazilian territorial dynamics before 1950.
areas, reconstruction of urban environments, restoration
of natural habitats and restoration of conservation units
and ecological havens (IPEA 1997).
Nowadays, as the majority of the Brazilian population lives
in urban areas, urbanisation is an irreversible process.
Urbanisation is intrinsically associated to the development
model in place. Concentrations of people and activities exert
pressure on space and natural resources. The current state
of the urban environment in terms of water, air and soil
quality and the impacts caused by this process, specially
on the population’s health and standard of living, call for
responses that address both protection and recovery of the
natural environment regarding the reduction of wide social
gaps in the production of environmental goods and services.
policies feedback
3.1.2 Municipalization and Globalization
The administrative decentralisation desired by the country
holds the strengthening of the municipality as a prerequisite.
The transfer of responsibilities, mainly in the areas
of education, health, basic sanitation and transportation,
among others, without the resources needed to carry them
out, may stir up the social, economic and environmental
inequalities among the municipalities, who may or may not
be financially able to cope with these new functions.
Consequently, this reality presents new challenges which
require the formulation of indicators and appropriate policy
instruments, linked among themselves and oriented
towards a common purpose for social, economic and
sustainable environmental development and for integrated
territorial management.
Where means for transboundary integration of productive
chains prevail, the national market has been reducing its
power to explain the dynamic behaviour of production and
goods distribution. The institutions in charge of the
environment have very little control over the problems
generated by sectorial public policies related to agriculture,
industry, urban development, mineral exploitation, forest
resources and infrastructure work in general. Environmental
management practices are often limited to damage
correction, such as reforestation, restoration of degraded
Likewise, the notion of limits as a dividing line between
territories and national markets has lost a lot of its power
due to the fluidity of the international circuits of goods and
capital. Consequently, this power has now been transferred
to the multinational companies who are able to define their
respective areas of influence through economic
mechanisms.
233