Dominican Republic and Haiti: Country Studies

Dominican Republic: The Society and Its Environment
Familia—Conapofa) offer family planning services. By the
1980s, both organizations were trying to make their programs
more responsive to the needs of rural families. In the 1980s,
the groups focused on population reduction along with maternal
and child health. The focus shifted in the 1990s to achieving
a balance among population level, economic development,
and progress toward social well-being.
Birth control encounters strong resistance from both sexes,
especially in the countryside and the smaller cities. Although
women use a variety of substances believed to be contraceptives
or abortifacients, there is considerable misinformation about
family planning. Many men believe birth control threatens
their masculinity; some women think various contraceptive
methods cause sickness. Dominican migrants who travel
abroad are more aware of the available options, and some
women migrants use modern contraceptives.
Population Distribution
With regard to demographic distribution, the traditional
(nonadministrative) subregions of the country include Valdesia
and Yuma in the southeast, Enriquillo and Del Valle in the
southwest, and the Central, Eastern, and Western Cibao in the
north. The subregion of densest settlement is Valdesia on the
southern coast, which contains the nation's capital and, according
to the 1993 census, 41 percent of the population. Roughly
one-third (30 percent in 1993) of all Dominicans live in the
National District, the area surrounding the national capital of
Santo Domingo. The other major area of settlement is the Central
Cibao, which accounted for 23 percent of total population
in 1993 (see table 2, Appendix).
Administrations have attempted to control population
growth and distribution since the 1950s. The Trujillo regime
fostered agricultural colonies scattered throughout the countryside
and strung along the western frontier with Haiti. Some
were coupled with irrigation projects. In the late 1970s, some
new joint projects with Haiti were approved by President Silvestre
Antonio Guzman Fernandez (1978-82).
Beginning in the late 1970s, the government also set up
industrial free zones around the country. Although the desire
to increase employment was the government's primary motivation,
the establishment of free zones also had as a secondary
goal the dispersal of industrialization, and thus migration, away
from Santo Domingo (see Manufacturing, ch. 3). Intercensal
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