the greatest volume of remittances in the world, with a flow of US$40 billion in 2004 and 27% of all remittances to nonindustrialized countries (Acosta et al., 2007). In part, due to remittances many countries in Central America and the Caribbean have been transformed from agroexport economies to labor-exporting economies (Orozco, 2002). The volume of family remittances in LAC began to grow in the 1980s and that trend continues and is even more accentuated today. For example, remittances received in Mexico increased from US$1 billion in 1980, to US$3 billion in 1990, to US$6 billion in 2000 and by 2004 reached US$18 billion (Orozco, 2002; Acosta et al., 2007). For Haiti, in 2004 family remittances accounted for more than 50% of GDP and for Jamaica, Honduras, El Salvador, the Dominican Republic, Nicaragua and Guatemala, they accounted for 15 to 20% of GDP (Figure 1-5). In El Salvador, remittances occasionally exceed the total value of exports and in Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic they represent more than half of the value of exports (Orozco, 2002). In some countries of LAC, remittances have become a major source of support for the communities. Although very little is known about the impact of remittances on poverty, a recent study suggests that remittances contribute to economic growth of the region and to diminishing inequalities (Acosta et al., 2007).
1.5.4 Political context
In LAC, the 1980s saw the fall of the last military dictatorships and a process of democratization unfolded which, albeit with many shortcomings, provided a political opening to the most excluded sectors. In addition, in the region (with the exception of Cuba), neoliberal reforms have generated a mix of dispossessed, displaced, informal workers and migrant workers forced to survive and adapt to a new reality of unemployment or underemployment, vulnerability, precarious living conditions and hunger. The masses of dispossessed, in both the countryside and cities of LAC, are organizing new social movements that are challenging the neoliberal regimes (Aguirre Rojas, 2005). This new form of populism is expressed in the form of broad social movements that are beginning to have a major political impact in the region (Gilly, 2005; Dussel, 2007). For example, there is no doubt that the rise of the Zapatista movement in Mexico played a part in the defeat of the Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI), which had been in power for 79 years. In Bolivia, the indigenous movements brought an indigenous candidate to the presidency. These social-political movements without political party affiliations are changing the political landscape of the region and turning Latin America to the left.
     These movements are advocating internal changes that are important in the context of this evaluation, although they do not yet have the political strength that would enable them to bring about substantial changes. Among the most important issues are: (1) recognition of the rights of indigenous nations and the growing role that indigenous organizations are playing in national politics; (2) demands for agrarian reform, especially land redistribution; (3) demands relating to access to and control and sustainable management of natural resources, including mining and energy resources and water; and (4) the insertion of

the concept of food sovereignty in the national and international debate.
     In Latin America, indigenous peoples live inside and outside protected areas, in tropical forests and in intertropical rural areas. Most live in marginal rural areas (Toledo, 2001). Their communities, territories/lands and natural resources continue to be subject to several pressures as well as a growing demand on the part of forces internal and external to their local communities (Kearney, 1996). This situation suggests, significantly, that the contemporary neolibral policies of the nation-states of the region and the respective democratic regimes, among other things, (1) have not put in place or facilitated clear and coherent policies, institutions and spaces for the participation of the indigenous peoples in rural/agrarian development and in the economy and society; and (2) have not supported, in a sustained and significant fashion, the strengthening of indigenous institutions, leaders and wise people. All of this has continued perpetuating the marginalization and oppression of the region’s indigenous peoples. Nonetheless, as mentioned above, the indigenous movements have strengthened significantly, becoming an
important political force in some of the countries with the largest indigenous populations, such as Bolivia, Peru, Mexico, Guatemala and Ecuador (Varese, 1996; Warren and Jackson, 2003; Yashar, 2005).

1.5.5 Environmental context
1.5.5.1 General aspects of the environmental context
Latin America and the Caribbean is well known for its extraordinary biodiversity, containing five of the ten countries in the world with the highest biodiversity (Dixon et al., 2001); it has 40% of the world’s plant and animal species (UNEP, 1999a). It is considered the world’s leader in floristic diversity (Heywood and Watson, 1995) and in avian diversity (UNEP, 2006). While 11% of the terrestrial area of Latin America is officially under protected status (World Bank, 2006b), many protected areas exist on paper only and consequently much of the area’s biodiversity is highly threatened. Almost half of the ecoregions of Latin America and the Caribbean (82 of 178) are considered critical or endangered in conservation status (Dinerstein et al., 1995). Some 873 vertebrate species in Latin America are currently estimated to be threatened with extinction and six of the twelve countries with the highest number of globally threatened bird species are found in the region (UNEP, 2002b). Unfortunately, there is little data on the extent to which arthropod species are threatened.
     The Latin American region possesses 28% of the world’s forest area, almost a billion ha in total (World Bank, 2005a); it contains the vast majority (68%) of the world’s tropical rain forests (UNEP, 2005b). Deforestation has accelerated precipitously since 1950. It has been primarily caused by agriculture (MA, 2005a) and cattle, and more recently soybean production has been one of the major drivers for the
region as a whole (Ledec, 1992; Angelsen and Kaimowitz, 2001). The overall annual deforestation rate from 2000 to 2005 in the region is estimated at 0.51% (World Bank, 2005a), but there is considerable variation across the region (Table 1-6). Historically the highest absolute amount