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El Salvador Demographic Trends
The population of El Salvador at the time of the national
census in 1971 was 3,549,000. According to estimates, population
growth averaged 3.4 percent annually in the 1970s and 2.4 percent
in the 1980s. One United States government estimate claimed a
1988 population figure of 5,389,000 (estimates vary). Although El
Salvador's high rate of population growth was similar to that of
other Central American countries, the social and political
effects of this population increase were aggravated by the very
limited national territory available for the population.
Consequently, El Salvador also consistently had very high
population density. From a figure of 170 persons per square
kilometer in 1970, density has been projected to rise to about
230 persons per square kilometer in 1980 and to an extremely high
420 persons by 2000. El Salvador is the most crowded country of
Central America (indeed, of all Latin America), and that
condition will continue into the foreseeable future. This
demographic situation has further exacerbated the problems
associated with the inequality of national resource distribution.
But the consequences of these demographic pressures have not been
limited to El Salvador. Historically, high Salvadoran population
density has contributed to tensions with neighboring Honduras, as
land-poor Salvadorans emigrated to less densely populated
Honduras and established themselves as squatters on unused or
underused land. This phenomenon was a major cause of the 1969 war
between El Salvador and Honduras
(see The 1969 War with Honduras
, ch. 1).
The distribution of population in El Salvador also remained
uneven. The least densely populated areas were the northern
departments of Chalatenango, Morazan, and Cabanas, encompassing
the marginal land and rugged terrain of the descending slopes of
mountain ranges that peak in Honduras
(see Physical Features
, this ch.). In contrast, the areas of greatest settlement were in
the fertile central zone, where there was a large rural
population, and in the major urban areas, including the San
Salvador metropolitan area (which had 828 persons per square
kilometer in 1971), Santa Ana, and San Miguel.
The department of San Salvador was the most populous of El
Salvador's fourteen departments, with a population density in the
mid-1970s of 825 persons per square kilometer. The second most
densely populated department at that time was neighboring
Cuscatlan, with 206 persons per square kilometer. All other
departments had less than 200 persons per square kilometer.
Observers believed that significant population growth would
continue in the capital, San Salvador, where the net increase in
population for the decade of the 1960s (202,000 persons) and of
the 1970s (327,000) almost equaled and exceeded, respectively,
the city's total population in 1950 (213,000). The population of
San Salvador in 1980 was estimated to be 858,000, a figure that
represented 30 percent of the total national population. The
capital accounted for approximately 60 percent of the total urban
population during 1950-80; its growth rates ranged between 4.4
percent and 5 percent during that period. Projections placed the
population of the capital at approximately 1 million by 1990 and
1.5 million by the end of the century.
The number of small urban centers under 50,000 inhabitants in
El Salvador increased from five in 1950 to eighteen by 1980.
Inhabitants of these centers comprised 24 percent of the total
urban population in 1980. San Miguel and Santa Ana, the two
secondary cities of the country, accounted for an estimated 15
percent of the total urban population in 1980 and had an
estimated annual growth rate of 3 percent (Santa Ana) and 4
percent (San Miguel) for the decades between 1950 and 1980.
Nevertheless, these two cities were unable to compete with San
Salvador in growth and prosperity. San Salvador's urbanized area
was 5.7 times as large as that of Santa Ana, the next largest
city, by the mid-1970s.
The urban population has grown approximately 50 percent in
each decade from 1950 to 1980 and was projected to increase 3.9
percent annually from 1971 to 2000, as compared with an
approximate rural population increase of only 30 percent per
decade and a projected annual rate of increase of 2.8 percent
from 1971 to 2000. But the rural population has been and will
continue to be significantly larger than the urban in absolute
numbers. The net rural population in 1971 was over 2.6 million,
but it was projected to reach an estimated 6 million persons by
the end of the century.
This high rural population growth rate accounted for the
relatively low share, only 30 percent, of the total national
population found in the capital in 1980. In addition, relatively
few "new cities," towns increasing from under to over 10,000
inhabitants, appeared in the three decades prior to 1980. Urban
growth therefore was limited primarily to increases in existing
cities. During the 1950-80 period, urban areas accounted for 35
to 40 percent of the national population increase; analysts
projected, however, that between 1980 and 2000 the urban sector
as a whole would probably have to absorb 48 to 57 percent of that
increase. San Salvador was expected to receive the bulk of urban
population growth, perhaps as much as 65 to 69 percent from 1980
to 2000, while the two secondary cities and the smaller urban
centers would decline somewhat in percentage of total urban
population.
Data as of November 1988
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