This article proposes a solution to alleviate socio-economic problems faced by rural areas in Western Siberia, such as the municipal districts of Omsk region, which are seasonally cut off from national transport infrastructure due to extreme climatic conditions. Specifically, it explores issues related to the provision of basic, everyday services in such regions. Based on an opinion poll which identified a significant need for better provision of everyday services such as hairdressing salons, repair shops and so on in remote regions of Western Siberia, the authors propose a model for an investment project to develop mobile units to provide such services. The costs of setting up such units and the period of time required to recoup those costs, as well as the benefits they will bring to the societies in question, are examined in depth. The provision of government financial support for setting up businesses engaged in this kind of social enterprise is also explored.

The main goal of the research is to improve the approaches to determining the agro-tourism potential of rural areas using the method of rating assessment. The methodology of the conducted research involves studying factors and conditions affecting the agro-tourism potential of rural areas and specifying the concept of agro-tourism potential; analysing existing methodologies for the assessment of tourism potential. During the analysis, we revealed weaknesses in existing methodologies and identified the directions for improvement of the approaches to assessing the potential of agro-tourism. Given the identified directions, the original rating assessment method of the agro-tourism potential in rural areas was developed, including the score system of the factors that underpin potential travellers' desire to purchase a proposed agro-tourist product and the factors, contributing to the successful economic implementation of the agro-tourism projects in rural areas. The methodology was tested on the example of the Omsk region municipal districts. With the results of the study, we rated municipal districts of the region by their attractiveness level for the development of agro-tourism and identified priority directions for the development of agro-tourism in the Omsk region. The obtained research results can be used to develop organization models of a regional agro-tourist cluster based on the specialization of certain rural areas in certain areas of the agrotourism development.Key words: Agro-tourism, rating assessment, development directions, region, effectiveness.Agro-tourism potential of rural areas is a complex socio-economic category, which is a set of interacting factors that contribute to the effective development of agro-tourism. Depending on the conditions that characterize rural areas and the factors influencing their development, they can be assessed and classified in terms of their attractiveness of the agro-tourism development.Rating assessment can become a classification tool for rural areas based on their agro-tourism potential. The present research is relevant, is of practical value and will be interesting to a wide range of individuals.Assessment issues of the agro-tourism potential of rural areas are examined in the works of O.N. Barsukova (2012) The aim of this study is to develop an assessment rating methodology for the agrotourism potential of rural areas. To achieve this goal, the following tasks are supposed to be solved:

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