Shared socioeconomic pathways in Brazil: Scenarios for population dynamics and the challenges to adaptation and mitigation

Abstract

During the past decades, there were scientific advances to better comprehend climate change and population dynamics. One of the main ones was the inclusion of a set of scenarios in current generation of climate modelling, with population as its human core. These are the shared socioeconomic pathways that result in population projections constructed by multi-dimensional demography, with population disaggregated by, sex, age and educational attainment. Such projections incorporate relevant population heterogeneities to adaptation and are potentially more sensitive to capture changes in demographic dynamics. This paper addresses this discussion for Brazil, considering both theoretical and methodological aspects. We highlight some of the implications of SSPs approach to construct population projections at the subnational level, emphasizing the benefits this agenda could bring to the population and environment fields.