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| Rural development will be increasingly
affected by political and economic decisions of the
European Community. This includes legal, economic, and political
driving factors. |
| The IIASA Core Group in
the ERD project will focus on Europe-wide, comparative
analyses of Rural Development - dealing with all five dimensions
mentioned above. IIASA has a comparative
advantage for this type of research due to its extended network of
collaborators and its multi-disciplinary approach. This Europe-wide
comparative perspective of the Core Group would be complemented by
the research of Focus Groups that could concentrate on one
particular region (such as Scandinavia or the Alpine Region) or one
specific problem, such as the impact of information technology on
rural development (see the organizational
scheme of the ERD project). |
| We
will also give special attention to the impact of global
trends on European rural development. For instance, we can expect
that the
WTO process will increase pressure on Europe's
agriculture. But there are other relevant trends of globalization.
For instance, information technology might lead to an expansion of
markets for certain products and services from rural areas - such as
in tourism and high-value products (such as vine). This research should be also
conducted by the IIASA Core Group. |
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Our Europe-wide comparative analyses
require the development of integrated and harmonized databases,
which is one of the major tasks of the ERD project. These databases
will include both socio-economic and bio-geophysical indicators.
Statistical data will be included at the regional level (NUTS 3), so
that spatially explicit analyses will be possible.
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