Category: Mexico

Abstract

This is paper discusses the family planning population policy implemented in Mexico in 1974, and also covered its effect on Mexico’s fertility and population age structure by comparing the demographic data before and after this policy. To better understand this policy, there is also some demographic background of Mexico in the last century. This population policy is for how to lower Mexico’s fertility rate to make its economy grow better. And it made a good performance on change Mexico’s fertility and demographic structure.

keywords: population policy, fertility, Mexico.

I. Introduction

This 1974 population policy in Mexico is about how to slow Mexico’s natural growth rate and change its demographic structure due to its overpopulation at that time.

Before the 1974’s policy, Mexico also had pursued some different population policies. The fertility rate in the 1950s to 1970s are very high, as shown in table 1, it basically stayed at 6.7%.In the early 1930s, Mexico formulated its first population policy to promote population growth by encouraging marriage and childbirth, childbirth health, immigration, and repatriation. The population policy was revised in 1947 to promote more migration. At that time, Mexico’s population grew by about half a million people each year. Between 1950 and 1970, Mexico’s population grew at a rate of 3.2% per year, almost double of the previous rate, and one of the highest growth rates in the world. The simultaneous increase in population and per capita income runs counter to the belief that economic development has led to a decline in fertility. This unusual demographic situation is called the ‘Mexico Paradox’. (Chen, 1990)

Table 1

Fertility from the 1950s to 1970s

This table shows the fertility of Mexico in 1955, 1960, 1965, and 1970. And data is from the statistics website Worldometers.

Almost at the same time, the mortality rate of Mexico began to decline, because of its developing medical and health situation. As the economy continues to grow, urbanization is accelerating, mortality is falling, and fertility is increasing. Mexico became one of the fastest population-growing countries in the world.

Because of Mexico’s year-after-year rapidly increasing population growth, and the gradual increase in the total population, the Mexican government is beginning to worry about their national economy. The growing population will reduce the living standards of residents and cause resource constraints within the country.

In the early 1970s, the government found that the rate of population growth was can’t matched the economic development, which is likely to reduce the living standards of residents. Then some officials believe that promoting family planning is a good solution. It has not only social and health benefits but also make economic growth.

So, In 1974, the government began to formulate this population policy, and President Echevarria announced a national family planning policy. The goal of the policy is to reduce population growth in order to improve living standards. Change the age structure of the population and its distribution across the country. Also emphasize the use of education, information and communication to build a better population culture. And promote women’s participation in the development process.

This 1974 family planning policy does have some effect on Mexico’s population and other demographic field. It has sharply reduced the fertility rate and changed their population distribution and age structure. I will discuss the evidence of effects in the rest of the paper by researching some journal articles written by others, and some demographic data from the Statistics website.

II. Population Background

Before tell the effect of this policy, I would like to discuss some population problems Mexico faced at the early 1970s.

After the government began to formulate a population policy aim to reduce fertility, President announced that a national family planning policy will be implemented in Mexico. The goal of the policy is to reduce population growth in order to improve living standards. More to change the age structure of the population and its distribution across the country. Also emphasize the use of education, information and communication to build a better population culture. And promote women’s participation in the development process. (Cabrera, 1994)

Until 1972, officials in Mexico seemed to think that the high annual population growth rate was not a real problem, as long as the rate of economic development remained ahead of the population growth rate. The population in 1972 increased to 54 million. The General Law of 1947 was actually promoting population growth. It was not until the 1960s that the concept of elites changed, and privately funded family planning programs became more active. President Echevarria announced the National Family Planning Plan and the National Population Commission in 1974. (Nagel, 1978)

The results of the 1970 census confirmed that Mexico’s population has grown to more than 50 million. If this growth rate continues, there will be about 135 million people in Mexico by 2000. (Cabrera, 1994)

We can see the population pyramid of Mexico in the 1960s in figure 1, it has a wide base and narrow top which suggests high fertility and a rapidly growing population. And at the same time period, the population pyramid of US is shown in figure 2, which is narrow in the middle and wide at both top and bottom. Showing that the US population at that time, although was going through the baby boom, it has a lot of older population. Compare with the US population pyramid in the 1960s, we can find that Mexico’s population structure was facing a serious age problem, where there are too many young people and very less old people.

The proportion of youth is too large, which will cause huge population growth inertia. And it is not conducive to the healthy development of the population. Will increase the country’s economic pressure and lower the education level of the population, and cause employment difficulties, housing shortages, slow or even decline in living standards, and environmental problems. Basically are not conducive to improving the quality of the population.

III. Policy Implementation

Therefore, in 1974, the Mexican government began to promote a family planning policy.

The government has created institutions to help implement the policy. Between 1976 and 1982, they launched several health programs for rural residents. During this period, more than 3,000 rural health clinics and 73 regional hospitals were established. (potter, 1999.)

Mexico’s rural population at the time faced more challenges than urban areas. It has a much higher fertility rate and a much lower contraceptive prevalence rate compared to the urban. Most external observers, especially those involved in implementing population policies, consider promoting contraception and reducing fertility in rural areas a major challenge. The commissioned public health agency has launched a major plan to extend its coverage to rural areas.

The Rural Health Program of the Department of Health which called SSA first recruited community health workers in more than 11,000 communities. In late 1976 to 1982, due to unforeseen changes in the Mexican government, the plan was replaced by a more comprehensive rural health plan implemented by the Mexican Institute of Social Security (IMSS). (Potter, 1999.)

In rural programs, both the SSA and IMSS emphasize family planning. Improved the education of women, by teaching women the benefits of having a small family and changing their mind of religious favor which prefer to have more children in a family. Also promoting the use of contraceptives. The contraceptive methods encouraged are intrauterine devices and female sterilization. These services are provided free of charge to most women and are strongly encouraged shortly after birth. Hospitals and clinics are assigned monthly targets to implement the methods described above. To exacerbate the fear of using this method in 90% to 93% of patients surveyed, doctors and nurses point out members of other communities that seem to have successfully used these methods.

Since then, the Mexican government has launched ambitious mass communication and sex education programs to attract new attitudes. The plan came into effect in mid-1979, with population growth reaching 2.9%, close to the 2.5% target set by new President Lopez Portillo in 1982.

IV. Theoretical Model or Theoretical Framework

Since this family planning policy is reducing fertility by improving education and health care. A journal article discussing the relationship between education and fertility, written by Karin Monstad, Carol Propper and Kjell G. Salvanes, provides strong evidence that the increase in education on women have a tendency to reduce fertility and postpone women’s age when they give the first birth. Their theory is that the decline in fertility is usually attributed to the increase in women’s education.

Because fertility and education levels change over time, it is difficult to establish a causal relationship. In this article, the author studies the link between fertility and education using education reform as a tool to control selection. Their results indicate that increased education leads to the postponement of first births to teenage mother and affect some of the women who have their first birth in their 20s to change the first birth age to the age of 35 to 40. (Monstad, Propper, and Kjell, 2008.)

This gives theoretical evidence of how this family planning policy work to reduce the fertility rate. It reduces fertility by improving women’s education and their health knowledge.

V. Impact of the Policy

In 1975, the average fertility rate in Mexico was 6.0%. And this number changed to 4.5% in 1980. (Potter, 1999.) Despite there is still a high fertility rate in rural areas, the total fertility rate in a rural area is about 7.4 births per woman, it is a decline from the peak compared with the earlier ten years. An empirical study found that when the government implemented a family planning policy, fertility rates began to decline, with the encouragement of the Mexican government, an increase in living standards in Mexico has led to a decline in population growth compared to strict birth control methods. ( Chen, Hicks, Johnson, and Rodreguez, 1990.)

According to the National Survey, by the end of 1976, the number of accounted the use of contraceptive methods for women at childbearing age in Mexico is 41.50%. New information and contraceptive methods are being explored to cover Mexico’s dispersed rural population and reduce the average family size from an average of 6.5 children per woman to 2-3 children between 1973 to 1975. Family planning has changed Mexico from a natural growing fertility environment in which the number of children is determined by social and economic factors, to a population environment that couples limit their number of children by using pre-modern or modern contraceptive methods.

In order to see the demographic changes in Mexico more clearly, there is a population pyramid of 1990’s Mexico in figure 3, we can see that Mexico’s population pyramid has changed compared wit 1960 one. Though its new born number still very large, it has a better age structure. And the large new birth is because of the big population base. This population pyramid suggests a population with low fertility rates and a tendency of a lower fertility rate.

By estimated, if there were no population policies, the annual population would increase by 2.8 million. Medical expenses will increase 60 percent. Overall, there are few jobs opportunities and residents do not have enough space to live. Poverty caused by too many births will hang over the country. However, by the late 1970s, fertility in Mexico had fallen rapidly. In 1995, the fertility rate in rural Mexico had fallen below 4, and the proportion of married women using contraceptives was close to half of the total.

VI. Conclusion

In the early 1970s, Mexico was plunged into a problem that excessive population growth which will negatively affect the country’s economic development. As they already had experience in implementing population policies, they established a family planning population policy in 1974 to promote its population health. This policy aims to reduce Mexico’s population growth and improve its structure and quality. And its specific measures are to improve the education on women, teach them contraceptive methods, and improve the local health insurance and medical care institution. These measures all implemented successfully.

Because Mexico’s population is slowing down and increasing at a steady rate, I think their population policy has worked very well. Since the policy is working, the population is classified at a satisfactory growth rate. The reason why I think it is important to know this family planning policy is that I think Mexico is an example of how an overpopulated country can slow down its growth rate and also sustain a stable economy. It provides a very good natural experiment to research.

Reference

1. Chen, Jain-Shing A., Hicks, W. Whitney, Johnson, S.R., and Rodriguezi, Raymundo. 1990. “Economic Development, Contraception and Fertility Decline in Mexico.” Journal of Development Studies, pp. 408-24.
2. Cabrera, Gustavo. 1994. “Demographic Dynamics and Development: The Role of Population Policy in Mexico.” Population and Development Review, Vol. 20, pp. 105-120.
3. Monstad, Karin. Propper, Carol. and Salvanes, Kjell G. 2008. “Education and Fertility: Evidence from a Natural Experiment.” The Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Vol. 110, No. 4, Economics of Education and Human-Capital Accumulation, pp. 827-852
4. Nagel, NS. 1978. “Mexico’s population policy turnaround.” Popul Bull.
5. Potter, Joseph E. 1999. “The Persistence of Outmoded Contraceptive Regimes: The Cases of Mexico and Brazil.” Population and Development Review, Vol. 25, No. 4, pp. 703-739
6. Worldometers, Mexico demographic data.
7. https://www.worldometers.info/demographics/mexico-demographics/

It was the winter of 2013 and it was the last day of school before Christmas break, the weather was cold and grey as usual this time of year. I was excited for Christmas break but mostly nervous because my dad and I planned a trip to Mexico for the next two weeks. I had never been to Mexico or even thought of going because it was unfamiliar to me even though my whole family was from there.

As a ten-year-old my view on Mexico wasn’t bad or good, I couldn’t judge since I have never been, but I’m not going to lie and say I was thrilled because I thought it would be really different. The day finally came for us to leave, my mom drove us to the bus station, yes, we were taking a bus instead of a plain because my dad wanted me to experience all of the Mexican cities on our way there. We got to the bus station and said bye to my mom. “Cuídate hija te quiero mucho”, – my mom said, which meant ‘Take care I love you so much’. I gave her a kiss and got on the bus with my dad. I could tell my dad was excited for me to finally go to the place where he grew up in and finally experience it.

It was around four in the afternoon when we boarded the bus and this ride would take about nineteen hours, twenty-one if you include the stops and the switching of buses at the border. On our way there we were crossing the cities in Texas. I wasn’t so excited, I had already seen most of the South Texas cities since my dad was an eighteen-wheeler driver, and I’ve had been on the road with him a couple times. I feel tapping on my shoulders and a voice saying “wake up”. It was my dad. “What time is it?”, – I ask. “It’s one in the morning, were about to cross the border to Mexico and I need you to get ready, because we’re going to switch onto another bus”, – my dad responded. I couldn’t believe I fell asleep for eight hours but at least I was finally going to see Mexico and see why my dad has been so excited this whole time. We load off the bus and they check our luggage and ask us questions like: “Why are you going to Mexico?”, “Are you a US citizen?”. As a ten-year-old I didn’t know it was a big deal going into another country, so of course I panicked. Luckily, my dad had my back so they let us board on to the other bus taking us to Mexico City.

As the bus started crossing the border, I said something that is so funny to me till this day, “Dad this doesn’t look any different from Texas”. “Well honey that’s because we just crossed a border that separates the United States and Mexico like 10 feet”, – my dad said sarcastically. My dad proceeded to tell me that we still had eleven more hours to go to get to the actual city of Mexico. I groaned in boredom and planned to take another long nap on the bus until we got there. Once again, I woke up only this time it was during the day, I had no idea where we were but I looked outside the bus window and it was so beautiful. All you could see covering the land was really big grassy hills which in Mexico are commonly known as ‘Cerros’. On top of those hills were really amazing designed buildings. They had their own uniqueness and were very colorful, I had never seen anything like it before. A few minutes later the bus driver announced that we were a few minutes from the bus terminal and to get our stuff together so we could be ready.

My palms were sweaty, but because now I’m full with excitement to experience another country that I’ve never been to. My dad and I get off the bus and immediately the smell of food hits me. It was Christmas time so around every corner of the bus terminal were hard working people selling food. My dad calls the person who was going to pick us up from the bus terminal and says it was going to be a few minutes before he got there, immediately I asked my dad if we could go to one of the food stands because the food looked so good. He says “yes”, and we walk up to the stand and order something. Since it was Christmas time, the only thing they had was tamales and ‘champurrado’, so that’s what we got. As I took the first bite it was so delicious, it was full of flavor and you could tell everything was made from scratch, it was better than any Mexican food I had tried back home.

The guy finally picked us up and I stood there while my dad greeted him, my dad told me to say hi because that was my cousin, I was surprised not going to lie because the only family I’ve ever met were two of my uncles and two of my cousins that lived back in Dallas. Growing up, I always thought I didn’t have much family because I never saw anyone. I was really happy to know I had a cousin here in Mexico and it probably meant I had more family here to. He drove us to a house where we would be staying and it turns out it was one of my aunt’s houses. As I walk in many people come up to my dad and I and start greeting us and hugging us, I was very confused because I didn’t know who they were, but of course it was more family. Everyone was so welcoming and I felt at home right away.

The next day I woke up to the sound of a rooster making noise, which I thought only happened in movies but I was excited because it was Christmas Eve. My family was woken up already making food for tonight because Mexicans usually celebrate Christmas on Christmas Eve and stay up until twelve in the morning for Christmas. I went to the kitchen to help make the food, and making the food my dad grew up with just gave me a view on how his childhood was. As the day continued it was eventually night time and my aunt said we were going to another one of my aunt’s houses to celebrate there, all I could think about was how big my family could get. We hopped on a ‘microbus’ which is a very popular form of transportation in the city of Mexico and drove to another city. On our way there I was looking outside the window of the bus and it was so beautiful, kids playing on the street, colorful lights filling the city, music blasting, fireworks in the air, and the famous statue of baby Jesus with the Virgin Mary in front of every house we passed. It was like a whole different world to me; people were full of joy and excitement.

When we got off the bus, my dad said “Guess what the name of this city is”. “I don’t know I’ve only been here a day”, – I said laughing. My dad proceeded to tell me that the name of the city was ‘Neza’, I gasped in joy because that was my name and I couldn’t believe I was named after a city in Mexico. My dad told me that he grew up in that city and that it was very special to him, that’s why he decided to name me Neza, after he told me that I felt more connected to my dad than ever. We start walking into a very large house, and as we walk in, I see about fifty people in that house, I felt very overwhelmed because I’ve never seen that many people in one place alone. My dad told me everyone there was related to me in some way. “See you have family”, – he said with a big smile. As the night went by, I met some of my cousins, we played out in the streets the whole night until it was time to eat. We ate and then the clock finally struck twelve, my cousins and I opened our presents, and all I could think about was how blessed I was to have such a wonderful family by my side.

Christmas finally passed and after that we spent the rest of the trip going to different places in Mexico City. I got to go to one of the biggest fairs there, to the famous Aztec pyramids, and many more places. The last day of the trip came and I was very sad it was time to go, I got attached to my family really fast, and it was hard having to let go. My perspective on Mexico definitely changed at the end of this trip, I got to learn more about my culture and my family history in just two weeks. As I got on the bus, all I could think about was how I wanted to go back again already because this trip was something I could never forget.

In this paper, I am going to reflect on the impacts that extractive policies have on the populations in which they are carried out, the criminalization of social protest and the violation of human rights that takes place for this reason, since that the contamination of water and natural resources produce alterations in the environment and in health that negatively affect the inhabitants and the territory where they settle. Indigenous peoples establish a particular relationship with the environment, as various studies have highlighted. For this reason, they raise the need for the defense of ‘territory’, a broader concept of ‘land’, since it implies the place where one lives, but also where the ancestors lie, where the sacred places are located, where it is cultivated land and inhabited, almost always in the vicinity of rivers and water sources. That is, the place where the roots, history and life meet. Thus, an indigenous leader maintains: “It is not that we are the owners of water, it is that water is our life and that is why we have a mandate … to be at the same time their children, but also their guardians, their protectors”.

Faced with the advance of extractive policies (oil, mining, wind power) in the indigenous regions of Mexico, the political discourse of the activists and the indigenous movement recovers the dimension of its environment as a territory, to oppose it to the environmental devastation they produce these policies. At the same time, a movement has been generated in the study region against megaprojects, which has unleashed an information campaign, intensifying ties with other environmental organizations, which is why a wide range of opponents belonging to various indigenous peoples and the mestizo population have already formed. They reflect on the roots and the meaning of the progress they seek, debate and contribute different perspectives on this hot topic. Similar concerns take place in the lands of southern Veracruz, in Nahua and Totonacan communities and municipalities of the Sierra Norte de Puebla and among the Zoques of Chiapas, among other cases in Mexico. Defending the territory and life is at the center of the approaches of the organizations that intend to resist against the mega-projects resulting from neoliberal policies. But this activism of civil society organizations has its counterpart in the criminalization of social protest and the possible persecution of its leaders, putting their lives at risk.

Some interviewees maintain that ‘before’ (in the first decades of oil exploitation) they did not protest because, despite the damages, there was enough land to move to cultivate, in addition to the ‘ignorance of the grandparents’ who were illiterate, they did not know the laws and there was no more information on the ways to claim damages, if they exist. Added to this is the fact that during the unquestionable government of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) its hegemony established limitations for protest and social discontent. According to oral testimonies, the mobilizations that demand support from PEMEX through the closure of highways, oil wells and various types of protests, date back to a couple of decades, from before the Energy Reform, which relates the changes in energy policy with an advance in the knowledge of the subject of human rights, the reduction of illiteracy, the diffusion carried out by the media and migration that opens horizons. This suggests that there are modifications in the way in which peasants represent themselves in their relationship with PEMEX and with the oil bureaucracy.

When PEMEX was a nationalized company (since 1938), the affected residents related directly to these actors without intermediaries. Since the privatization process of PEMEX began, towards the end of the eighties, this relationship has gradually become more complex, as private companies, which are in the area for a certain time, began to operate, and then they leave, fragmenting the representations that the inhabitants have about the oil company. In local representations, the stability provided by the nationalized PEMEX faces the instability and dispersion caused by the multiple companies that carry out only part of the work. When they talk about its effects, the farmers summarize the problem by referring to this complex network of companies talking about PEMEX, as if the company continues to function without the changes that have taken place since the 1980s.

With the criminalization of social protest, state policies become an expression of the defense of interests promoted by extractivism. Repression is one of the ways to criminalize, to which must be added the way in which justice operators interpret the laws, as well as the creation of a new legal framework that aims to protect extractive interests (Observatory of Mining Conflicts of Latin America, 2011). There is no doubt that there are social and environmental impacts – such as the contamination of streams and water sources – that affect all inhabitants equally. However, it is necessary to contextualize how these impacts occur in particular situations, to show the type of reconfigurations that are produce. In other words, extractive policies have diversified impacts that, depending on the context, penetrate all the pores of the social body and the environment. In the case of the inhabitants who are without water due to oil exploitation, in this municipality where the green of the vegetation and the abundance of the rivers is dazzling, the community dynamics and the daily life of the people are altered due to the lack of liquid, affecting food, health and agricultural production, among other issues. The owner on whose land an oil spill occurs, has to reconfigure the use of space since he cannot continue with his crops, vanilla production ends and citrus production runs the risk of contamination. The young imprisoned woman has to adjust her body, her emotions and family dynamics due to the detention she suffers, in addition to overcoming the fear and anguish caused by distance and imprisonment.

Finally, in this paper I have pointed out three cases in which an arrest warrant was issued against authorities in their communities, although only this woman’s materialized, because the other two took cover. But these events, which took place in the context of the new legislation derived from the Energy Reform, are a wake-up call to show the tense relationship that currently exists between PEMEX, the private companies that still operate in the region, the peasants and the symbolic power of the State to intimidate citizens through its intention to criminally sanction the authorities that represent them. The issue of the violation of human rights and the rights of indigenous peoples acquires singular relevance in these contexts.