Best Practices in Twenty‐First‐Century Rural Development and Policy

Abstract

The combination of less than perfectly mobile resources (human and other), pervasive urbanization trends with potentially significant (positive and negative) externalities, and an environment of fiscal restraint suggests the need for more effective rural development and policy. In contrast to historical sectoral or fad-based policies, place-based rural development programs and policies focus on rural populations in the context of a realistic assessment of the opportunities and constraints they face. Among the most promising opportunities are 1) improving integration (possibly through connective infrastructure) with urban economies in order to access agglomeration economies, 2) enhancing rural amenities, and 3) increasing entrepreneurial capacity. Copyright (c) 2010 Copyright the Authors. Journal compilation (c) 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc..

Shifts in rural planning in the US and India

“…Programmes related to social justice, participatory decision-making, sustainability, and the environment have taken second place to economic transformation of rural production. But there is a concurrent literature and policy emphasis in rural planning that is place based and enjoying some resurgence due to concerns about sustainability and resilience of settlements and communities (Olfert and Partridge 2010). Thus, the inherent tension between growth and sustainability that emerged towards the latter part of the twentieth century in the thinking about national development planning still exists in the developing world and is increasingly apparent in the developed.…”

Promoting Rural Development through the Use of Land Consolidation: The Case of Korea

“…Land is not only relevant for agricultural production, but can also be considered in terms of the quality of the landscape, which can become an important asset in attracting tourism, a residential population and enterprises in the service sector (Chevalier, 2005). However, an amenity such as an attractive landscape cannot be relied on alone, as infrastructure to facilitate rural development must also be created (Olfert & Partridge, 2010). Sectoral approaches to rural development may fail to address these complexities.…”

The Impact of the Comprehensive Rural Village Development Program on Rural Sustainability in Korea

“…Olfert and Patridge [15] suggested that development efforts targeting rural areas require rigorous empirical evidence. Winters et al [23] and Esposti and Sotte [17] urged that higher standards should be imposed for accurate discernment of the conditions under which rural development policies are justified and how they succeed.…”

“…However, the market-protected approach is highly reliant on government subsidies. Two imperative issues related to this reliance on subsidies are the tighter budget constraints and skepticism regarding the effectiveness of stimulus packages for the spatially targeted interventions [14][15][16]. A strong claim to construct a credible scientific schema that enables researchers to evaluate agricultural and rural policies has been presented from a diverse array of academic disciplines [7,[17][18][19].…”