In this study we attempt to understand the relationship between regional growth in population, employment, and per capita income, and farmland development in Maryland, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia. A spatial simultaneous equations model is estimated using county-level data. Results indicate that while county income growth and agricultural land value increases in neighboring counties increase the rate of farmland loss, growth in county agricultural land values, increases in agricultural land density in neighboring counties, and increases in agricultural

As a result of the Land Reform, property forming and land market, farm areas were often built up from a number of land plots (up to 20), sometimes with unfavourable order. With the rural development and stabilization of farm production, the role and tasks of rational territory organization are expected to increase significantly in the area. It can be forecasted that, as a result of land rent and further purchase and sell, and other transactions, many new farmland properties are expected to appear that will not correspond to the requirements of rational territorial organization.

Rapid and far-reaching development transition has triggered corresponding restructuring in rural China especially since the turn of the new millennium. Recently, there has been an increasing trend emphasizing regional resources in formulating rural development policy and restructuring rural areas. This paper analyzes the rural restructuring in China affected by the allocation and management of critical resources including human resource, land resource and capital, by establishing a theoretical framework of “elements-structure-function” of rural territorial system.

In European mountain areas, shrub encroachment resulting from farmland abandonment is most often managed by mechanical operations such as roller chopping or controlled burning, which have proved to be ineffective and unsustainable. Recent agroecological findings highlight the potential impact of grazing on long-term shrub dynamics. We thus explored the potential contribution of livestock farms to the management of shrub encroachment.

Insufficient energy supply and low levels of development are closely linked. Both are major issues in Uganda where growing demand cannot be met by overstretched infrastructure and the majority still rely on traditional biomass use. Uganda's renewable energy policy focuses on decentralised sources including modern biomass. In this paper, stakeholder dynamics and potential socio-economic impacts of eight modern bioenergy feedstock production models in Uganda are considered, and key considerations for future planning provided.

The territorial approach to rural development highlights the role of local actors, networks, culture, nature and landscape amenities. The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) definition of rurality is, however, not capable of dealing with local and community definitions of rurality, which vary from study to study. In everyday life, physical planners, rural policymakers and local rural actors need a consistent definition of rurality.

The multifunctionality of agriculture promoted by the Agriculture Act is difficult to reconcile with the intensive models dominant in Guadeloupe and Reunion. This is made clear by an analysis of the management rules and practices for territorial farming contracts, intended to implement this Act. The difficulty of this reconciliation can also be observed by the impact that the statute’s application has had on its targets — production units. We conducted open or conversation interviews with institutional personnel and with farmers who have signed these contracts.

The European Union Rural Development Policy (RDP) for the period 2007–2013 seeks to establish a coherent and sustainable framework for the future of Europe's rural areas and is closely related to the improvement of living conditions in the countryside involving aspects of housing, the environment, infrastructure, communication, employment possibilities, land management, etc. Such interventions are very welcome in many Central and Eastern European countries where land reform after the collapse of the Soviet regime has resulted in a worrying drift towards rural depopulation.

The present work aims to illustrate how organic agriculture can be a useful tool for the rural development in general, and particularly, in the Valencian Region. Valencian agriculture has some key characteristics that make it different to the agriculture practiced in other Spanish regions. Such specificity brings about the existence of particular problems which are intrinsic to this region (some, however, are common to all farmers). On the other hand, the common agricultural policy (CAP) has contributed to create other type of social and ecological problems in the European agriculture.

The paper aims to identify the rationality of peasant communities and their contribution to rural development in Kampong Thom province. To do so, an interdisciplinary analytical framework addresses the dynamics of land use and land tenure, the strategies of labor force allocation as well as the determinants of land and labor agricultural productivities amongst peasant communities. It rests on details field surveys in two communes located in very distinct agro-ecological settings of Kampong Thom province.