Promoting Rural Development through Mobility

Rural Transport and Territorial Development

Rural development involves more than just agricultural production: it is also closely linked to the economic utilisation of these products and the provision of basic social and economic services (see also article: Access to Transport). At local village level health and education facilities, supplies of means of production, alternative economic sectors and income-earning opportunities are often non-existent or very basic, making access to these things difficult.
Supra-regional links must therefore be improved or created in order to improve the socio-economic position of the rural population. Infrastructure measures make it easier for rural dwellers to link into regional and supra-regional economic life, and also facilitate access in the reverse direction. The previous local focus must therefore be replaced by greater territorial and even supra-territorial openness. Territorial development (GIZ 2012) therefore involves organising planning and construction processes according to the subsidiarity principle, with corresponding funding. This development can take place along one or more axes (country development axes) or corridors that are based on main transport arteries and use secondary transport routes as links.

Impacts of Infrastructure Measures

The positive impacts of infrastructure measures in the transport sector are therefore particularly large if they are embedded in a strategy of territorial development – that is, in a balanced development plan that involves the entire region. An important aspect of such plans is a functional and administratively well-organised division of labour between spatial centres, sub-centres and sparsely populated areas, and between different organisations and institutions. Despite being closely linked to other packages of measures, the impacts of investment in infrastructure as a component of spatial development and land-use planning are relatively easy to measure. These impacts include the following:

• Raw materials can be delivered both faster and more cheaply to distant markets, and can more readily be processed locally --> regional and supra-regional sale and producation of sensitive and local products. Moreover, markets in neighbouring regions can be accessed and diversified.
  
• Price fluctuations can be exploited more quickly and more promptly.
• It is easier for purchasers to access producers.
  
• It becomes easier to establish economic opportunities social services, such as health and education, and access to these services is therefore improved.
  
• The availability of means of production (tools, machinery, seed, fertiliser) is improved.
  
• Professional advice services, including private ones, can more readily be provided in rural areas.
  
• The need of urban population groups for nearby recreational facilities opens up new development potentials and alternative income-generating opportunities
  
• Transport costs are reduced; as a result, goods become cheaper for producers, traders and end consumers. Journeys become both shorter and faster.
• The risks arising from transport difficulties or failures are reduced. Transport materials are saved and there is less damage to goods.
  
• There is greater scope for inter-municipal links and inter-municipal exchange. Contact between local government workers and the rural population is improved --> participation in political events.
  
• Construction projects commissioned by local authorities (e.g. erosion control measures, construction of markets, stores or grain banks) can be completed faster and at lower cost.
  
• Transport routes stimulate the migration of labour. Rural areas benefit from additional investment and innovation as a result of remittances and the return of migrants.
  

The main beneficiaries are often women who derive little added value from agricultural production in itself or are not involved in it economically, but depend on the processing of agricultural commodities and hence on their export out of the region. Local and national government bodies will also benefit through better forestry controls, more reliable collection of taxes and duties and better supervision.

Corridors that are initially established purely for transport purposes can also have a beneficial knock-on effect on territorial development, since they can be designed to link a number of territorial areas. Trunk roads typically lead from the capital city to a neighbouring country via another large city, passing through several rural communities on the way. By means of rural and inter-village paths, these communities link their territory to the trunk road and hence to larger cities and to neighbouring provinces and countries, as well as to neighbouring communities. The trunk roads are used as corridors, from which access is created at both local/community and national/international levels. For landlocked countries, corridors to free ports in coastal countries are important. The transport activities themselves create new economic opportunities, which open up along these corridors. These potentials also radiate into the hinterland. It is therefore justifiable to state that corridors can become real axes of development.