The rural-urban continuum

Mainsgs1: Role of women and women’s organization, population and associated issues, poverty and developmental issues, urbanization, their problems and their remedies.)

Context:

• The rural-urban continuum or urban-rural continuum has drawn wide attention in recent years.
• The rural-urban continuum or urban-rural continuum  has evolved due to interactions of a complex set of geographical, cultural, economic and historical processes.

Understanding urban-rural interconnections:

• The traditional dichotomy of rural and urban, and the accordingly mandated governance structure, seems inadequate to understand and act upon poverty, undernourishment, education, health, environmental management or even development. 
• A 2021 World Bank Policy Research Working Paper, ‘Economic and social development along the urban-rural continuum-New opportunities to inform policy,’ advocated adopting the notion of urban catchment areas delienated along an urban-rural continuum. 
• Identification of such areas would help understand urban-rural interconnections, which is important for making policy decisions across development sectors and for addressing issues related to environment and natural resources management. 
• This would support geographically nuanced perspectives in development, required to address increasing spatial inequality.

Understanding the changing relationship:

• A 2008 report of the Desakota Study Team, ‘Re-imagining the Rural Urban Continuum,’ was based on studies in eight countries around the world including India. 
• It stressed on understanding the changing relationship between ecosystems and livelihoods under diversified economic systems across the rural-urban continuum as this has important policy implications at all levels. 
• In India, Kerala is well known for the rural-urban continuum in the coastal plain and this was noted even by Moroccan traveller Ibn Batuta in the 14th century. 
• Geographical factors supported by affirmative public policy promoting distributive justice and decentralisation have increased rural-urban linkages and reduced rural-urban differences in major parts of Kerala. 
• In recent years, the rural-urban continuum has developed in various parts of the country, although the underlying factors propping them up are different from those noted in Kerala. 
• The urban industrial interaction fields in India are spreading by linking rural areas and also small towns around the mega cities and urban corridors penetrating rural hinterlands.

Collapsing barriers:

• In 30 years, technology and economic globalization have increased mobility of resources and people, and enhanced inter- and intra-country connectivity. 
• The extension of transport and communication systems, improved access to energy, increased affordability private and public transport as well as penetration of economic and other networks into remote areas promote a rural-urban continuum. 
• The barriers due to physical distance are melting as increasing rural-urban linkages have given rise to diffused network regions. 
• The movement of goods, people, information and finance between sites of production and consumption has strengthened linkages between production and labour markets. 
• As the pull factors grow, push factors driving populations out from both rural areas and urban areas are also intensifying and in the process, a mixed economy zone of primary and secondary-tertiary sectors has evolved.

Viewing social and economic transformation:

• Discussions on social and economic development and environmental issues and their inter-linkages are not complete without acknowledging the rural-urban continuum. 
• Viewing social and economic transformation through this lens will help identify challenges for improving both urban and rural governance and opportunities for enhanced access to employment, services, institutional resources and environmental management. 
• The institutional connections between rural and urban areas operate at different levels for various development sectors. 
• The key challenge of decision-making is to build rural-urban partnership and  to achieve this, a systems approach is recommended where the city and the surroundings form a city region for which a perspective plan is prepared integrating rural and urban plans within a common frame. 

Conclusion:

• The city and the rural areas will finally move towards a post-urban world where the rural-dichotomy will no longer exist. 
• It is important that the rural urban linkages are better mapped, for which satellite-based settlement data and its integration with Census data may be useful.