The Population of the District of Vila Real

The District of Vila Real, with an area of 4,239 sq. km (roughly the size of the Spanish province of Pontevedra), had 230,000 inhabitants in the last census taken in 1991. The largest cities are all very small, when compared to provincial capitals in neighboring Spain. When we talk about population of urban centers two figures are used in Portugal, one for the concelho or municipality, which can be as large as 1,482 sq. km. (Alcácer do Sul in the district of Setúbal) or as small as 6 sq. km. (São João da Madeira in the district of Aveiro, and one for the urban center itself. Often it is difficult to determine which parishes make up the urban center and which make up the concelho. Official census figures give populations of concelhos and not urban centers, so this can be misleading. Often the head of the municipality can be relatively small with most of the population residing in rural parishes. Chaves, for example has 12,000 in the urban parishes (2) and 29,000 in 49 rural parishes for a total municipality population of 41,000.

In order of population, Vila Real capital has roughly 15,000 in the urban parishes, Chaves 12,000, followed by Valpaços, Peso da Régua, and the other seats of concelhos, all of which have less than 10,000 inhabitants.

The following table shows us the present population of the municipalities and demonstrates graphically the population loss that has taken place since 1960, when experts agree that most of these municipalities reached their highest numbers. Figures are rounded off to the highest number.

Districts	Area in Sq. Km.	Population in 1960	Population in 1991
Vila Real	4,239	325,000	230,000
Municipalities
Alijó	286	24,000	16,000
Boticas	315	14,000	8,000
Chaves	600	57,000	41,000
Mesão Frio	27	7,000	5,000
Mondim de Basto	174	10,000	9,000
Montalegre	782	33,000	15,000
Murça	171	10,000	7,000
Peso da Régua	94	23,000	21,000
Ribeira de Pena	223	13,000	8,000
Sabrosa	179	13,000	7.000
Sºta Marta Penaguião	69	13,000	9,000
Valpaços	538	34,000	22,000
Vila Pouca de Aguiar	419	25,000	16,000
Vila Real	360	48,000	47,000

As we can see from the numbers above, the population of the district of Vila Real is sparse, 54 people per square kilometer. Most of this population lives in the concelhos of the south—Vila Real, Santa Marta, Régua, Sabroso, and Alijó. The area between the district capital and the Douro river is especially more densely populated, with Régua having a population density of 212 per sq. km., and Santa Marta with 128. There is a relatively populated area east of the capital. North the population clusters follow the Corgo river valley with many small villages on the river valley or veiga south of Vila Pouca. The geological fault linking Vila Pouca with Chaves is also quite populated. Then north and south of Chaves population density increases (68 per sq km). The area to the west—the Barroso—or to the east—Serra do Brunheiro is sparsely inhabited. Montalegre has a population density of 22 per sq. km, although the number of small villages scattered across the area gives a different impression. A closer look shows that many of the houses are no longer lived in and many have been abandoned.

This population is mainly found in small isolated centers, similar to the Alentejo, with the difference that these settlements, much smaller than those in the Alentejo, are always located at a short distance from each other. Even the towns that are heads of municipalities are invariably small, many of them much smaller than villages in the Alentejo or the Algarve.

Much of this population still lives in villages, many of which have less than 100 inhabitants. Over seventy-five percent of the population in fact lives in centers with less than 5,000 people, which is the cutoff point for urbanization. If we take the total population of 230,000 in 1991 and single out the largest centers with more than 10,000 people—Chaves, and Vila Real—whose total population is less than 30,000, we can see that over seventy five percent of the population is rural or semi-rural.

In comparison we can look at neighboring Castilla-Leon where seventy five percent of the population lives in urban centers. In the province of Valladolid, for example, with a population of about half a million, three quarters of it (330,000) is concentrated in the flourishing capital of the same name. Zamora, capital has a population of 60,000 and the province 214,000. Burgos capital has 161,000 and the province 360,000. León capital has 147,000 and the province 531,000. The only region of Spain that has population characteristics similar to Vila Real is the hinterland of Galicia, especially in the province of Lugo and Orense. Lugo though, with 80,000, and Orense, with 100,000, are both larger than all Portuguese cities excepting Lisbon, Porto, and Setúbal.

This lack of middle-sized urban centers in the province is a reflection of the loss of population of the region as a whole over the last twenty years, due to lack of job possibilities. It also means that the Transmontano still has a rural lifestyle and all that this implies in cultural habits, including outlook towards education, innovation in business, and acceptance of different ideas.

Looking at population figures we see that from 1960 to 1991 the population of Vila Real decreased 95,000 people, or 29%, with a drop from 325,000 to 230,000; this put the district back before the levels of 1920. Most of this loss has taken place in the rural villages, many of which had less than 100 families. The north—the Terra Fria—also lost more people than the south. Chaves lost 28 % in thirty years and Montalegre saw 54% of its population disappear.

Populations of major towns either gained slightly or stayed the same while the population in the concelhos dropped in all situations. Only in Peso da Régua (because of the wealth brought by Port wine) and Vila Real capital (because of the university and proximity to Porto) has the population of the concelho held its ground. The difference between the two most important urban centers has become more accentuated in recent years with Vila Real clearly winning out in population growth. Vila Real went from 9,200 in 1950 to 15,000 in 1991, while Chaves, which had 12,200 in 1950 dropped to 11.700 in 1991. While many of the urban parishes have grown in these cities, the surrounding rural areas making up the municipalities have diminished. Out of 30 parishes in the municipality of Vila Real, 25 lost population. In Chaves, out of 51 parishes 47 lost population.

Another interesting comparison shows Chaves to be in 32^nd place in the list of urban centers in 1801 with 4,593 inhabitants (this shows the importance of the fortresses guarding the northern frontier). In the census of 1911 no centers in Tras-os-Montes appear in the top 30. In l940 the situation repeated itself. In 1960 Chaves appears in 31^st place with 13,156 and Vila Real appears in 47^th place with 10,263. In 1981 Bragança had climbed to 53^rd place, Vila Real had passed Chaves and occupied 61^st place, and Chaves had gone down to 70^th place out of a total of 78 urban centers classified. Little by little the district capitals in the region were losing their importance to the more highly developed coastal plain. In a new index called the Synthetic Indicator of the Intensity of Regional Problems, which takes into account variables like per capita PIB, unemployment rate adjusted to include sub-employment, and the future necessities of employment Tras-os-Montes ranked very low. With the EU average of 100 and Lisbon at 80.32, Bragança was 31.99 and Vila Real was the lowest in Portugal at 30.97. Historical impoverished districts such as Evora and Beja have improved and were ranked 53.87 and 45.00 respectively.

The reasons for this decline in population are twofold: a lower birth rate in recent years and emigration. We have seen in all of Portugal a decrease in the size of families with the average falling below 2.0 children per couple. It is not uncommon today to see families with only one child. Families with three or more are now rare. We have only to go back one generation to find families with five or more children.

But it has been emigration both abroad and to cities like Porto to which we should look for the main reason for the population decrease. The beginnings were modest. In the period of 1911-1920, only 305 emigrants officially left Portugal; in 1912 alone 77,000 left. The first emigrants went to Brazil, the land of opportunity. Even today a tasca or bar in Rio de Janeiro is synonymous with having a Portuguese owner. These emigrants were the desperately poor from the most isolated villages that suffered appalling conditions on cramped steamers to find a new future in the land where anyone could get rich.

If in 1900 90% of the total of emigrants chose to go to Brazil, from 1960 to1969 emigration patterns had already changed dramatically. Emigration to Brazil had dropped to 20% of the total. In that decade 860,000 people left the country; for the decade of 1970 to 1979 the number was 775,000. This sudden increase came about when the Common Market was formed. In some countries of the north there was spectacular economic growth, causing a need for labor in quantity, with low demands for high salaries, indifferent to labor organizations, capable of doing the hardest work, and with low social prestige. This emigrant was the Transmontano, young, probably a farmhand on the family’s subsistence farm plot, and unskilled. He, Manuel, was often semi-illiterate and worked as a window cleaner or as a street sweeper. She, Maria, was most likely illiterate, and worked as a house cleaner. They were to work hard and spend little in their host countries. Living in appalling conditions, their dream was to save up enough money to return to their beloved “terrinha.” Few had any desire to stay and become citizens of their new country.

The countries of choice were France (350,000 between 1960 and 1974), Germany, (150,000), and the USA and Canada (200,000). Other countries receiving emigrants were Switzerland, Luxembourg, Belgium, The United Kingdom—especially in London in restaurants and on the Channel Islands in the hotel and restaurant trade—Venezuela, South Africa, Australia, and even tiny Andorra. Emigration to Brazil had by this time slowed to a trickle. Officially emigration also began to decrease dramatically to France and Germany, but these statistics only included long-term official emigrants and not workers who go on temporary contracts. Today there is still much of this in the construction industry, especially in Germany. Long-term emigration has practically ended, except for substantial numbers still going to the United States and Canada (21,000 in 1988), many of these going to join relatives who are already there.

There has been little emigration to neighboring Spain. The possible reasons are threefold: the Spanish economy had not taken off in the sixties and seventies when emigration was at its peak, thus jobs were not available or were badly paid; the high level of unemployment in Spain makes job placement difficult for Portuguese who do not want to do the low-level jobs that are available and are filled by North Africans; and perhaps the age-old mistrust of the Spanish, a mixture of resentment and feelings of inferiority. Even today many emigrants resident in France will not stop anywhere in Spain even to eat or to fill their petrol tanks. Some in Chaves even carry extra tanks so as not to have to stop. There are a few hardy souls who have taken up residence in Spain though. In the province of León, near Ponferrada, there are Portuguese miners who come from the region of Vila Pouca de Aguiar, and more desperate Portuguese go as far as La Rioja to work in the seasonal harvest of the famous wine.

The results of this emigration have been not only desertification of the countryside and a subsequent decline in the percentage of the work force engaged in agriculture (from 80% in 1960 to 60% in Vila Real in 1991, still the highest in Portugal). There have also been effects on the division of income. The reduction of labor led to a greater pressure on the work market with subsequent increases in salaries. The money sent by the emigrants to their families (remessas) allowed for the modification of consumer standards of these families, influencing the sectors involved in the application of capital. The accumulated funds have been mostly invested in the building of houses, acquisition of land and consumer goods. These are weak investments in capital reproduction. This situation is evidence of the preference of the emigrants for investments that they consider safe—property (either lots or apartments, which are often left empty) and small businesses like cafés and grocery stores.

But the favored investment has always been the house in the outskirts of the villages they had been brought up in. The outlying area is usually chosen because the inner core of the villages, with their old, dilapidated stone houses, and narrow path-like streets is very difficult to build in. Besides changing the landscape where the houses with garish colors or covered with tiles have invaded hills and valleys, the development of a construction industry based on emigration has caused a certain increase in the areas surrounding the major towns. Often these buildings invade former agricultural lands. The valley of Chaves, one of the most fertile in the province, is rapidly filling with emigrant homes built on land that was zoned agriculture, and once was deemed almost sacred. Corruption or passivity has made this possible. The house goes up without anyone from city hall noticing or caring, and then once built, a small fine is paid, but the house can stay. Or a building for agricultural purposes is allowed, but this slowly takes on the functions of a family dwelling. In a short time the valley has become dotted with these constructions.

The influence of the returning emigrant, who has often been successful abroad, cannot be denied. In Chaves, for example, retornados (returnees) from Brazil built the two most important hotels, and emigrants who had been in Switzerland opened two Italian restaurants. But of course not all are success stories. Most of those who came back from France or Switzerland can dream about little more than taking over a café. Brazil was different. Not all returned with money to invest, but the more unexplored economy of that country allowed someone who had sufficient skills, luck and acumen to accumulate wealth and return with money enough to make large investments in the region.