The main aims of this International Conference are to gather articles and presentations that can contribute to enrich the debate on territorial consequences of rural-urban migration, depopulation and desertification. One of the consequences of several years of migration from rural to urban areas in Portugal, as it leaves the villages in the interior of the country depopulated, is cultural genocide. Design for Desertification is a research project that contextualises these issues within the Portuguese territory showing how economic decline, desertification and depopulation are interconnected and how rural development could present a solution to economic decline.