Key Geographic and Demographic Terms
Watershed
Watershed: The land area drained by a main sewer and its tributaries, whose limit is in the watersheds of each of the rivers that integrate it.
Natural Growth
Natural Growth: A demographic indicator in determining the quantities that the population of a country grows in one year; the difference between natality and mortality.
Real Growth
Real Growth: A demographic indicator that determines the quantities in real mode that the population of a country increases in a year. (Natural growth + Net migration).
Deciduous
Deciduous: A type of plant species that sheds its leaves during cold seasons of autumn and winter (e.g., Oak).
Census
Census: A national statistical count carried out every 10 years. It reveals the basic structure of the population (sex, age, occupation, etc.).
Zero Growth
Zero Growth: A demographic status in which the rates of natality and mortality are equal, resulting in aging.
Old Town
Old Town: The oldest part of a city; a built-up area comprising the middle of the 19th century. (In Spain, it denotes its medieval layout, Christian or Muslim).
Business Center
Business Center: The part of the city with the largest number of financial and business services, near the historic center.
Bedroom Community
Bedroom Community: Suburbs of big cities characterized by having a residential function.
Conurbation
Conurbation: An urban area formed by the growth of two or more cities that merge into a continuous urban area while retaining independence.
Slums
Slums: Improvised urban habitat that appears in large cities due to the accumulation of population without resources, arriving from the countryside.
Industrial Center
Industrial Center: A place where factories and industrial plants are concentrated on an industrial scale.
Wholesale
Wholesale: A type of internal trade where production is concentrated and retailing is redistributed.
Retail Trade
Retail Trade: Trade that is sold directly to consumers (small local sole proprietors).
Internal Trade
Internal Trade: The exchange of goods and commodities to and from the same country, wholesaler or retailer.
Foreign Trade
Foreign Trade: Trade in goods and commodities that is done with other countries; it reflects the value of imports and exports.
Land Consolidation
Land Consolidation: An agricultural policy that aims to increase productivity, giving each owner a single parcel or a few.
Agricultural Cooperatives
Agricultural Cooperatives: A type of goods and services company whose owners and managers are member farmers, with tax benefits.
Crops Under Plastic
Crops Under Plastic: An agricultural technique that involves covering a plot with plastic greenhouses to create a microclimate that accelerates the growth and maturation of crops.
Hydroponics
Hydroponics: Growing plants in aqueous solutions, with sand media.
Sanded Crops
Sanded Crops: An agricultural technique that prepares the ground with a layer of manure and sand, acting as a fertilizer (water-scarce areas).
Delta
Delta: An outgoing shoreline break; it is formed when a river yields more sediment than the sea can redistribute.
Dune
Dune: A mound of sand typical of sandy coastal areas, formed by the accumulation of sand by the wind.
Demography
Demography: The science that studies the movements of a group of people and their structure.
Population Density
Population Density: The number of inhabitants per unit area; it indicates the degree of concentration of the population.
Public Deficit
Public Deficit: A negative balance of the accounts of the state, as a result of spending more than initially budgeted.
Relocation
Relocation: The closure of a factory in one place to move it where production conditions are more favorable.
Currency
Currency: The legal tender of a country; to be used, it must be convertible outside the country (listed).