Verso un ruralità che promuove qualità sociale e ambientale

It is commonly accepted that a rural territory is associated not only to the space assigned to agricultural, forestry and zootecnical activities, but also to the composition of natural environment, farm culture and rural-non farm activities, realized in contexts of low demography. In wealthy societies and economies, the diminishing importance of the agricultural sector versus the other sectors and the increasing demand of enviromental services entail a new concept of rurality. Is it correct to prefigure that modern agriculture will learn to cultivate also the enviromental quality in rural territories? From a certain point of view the socio-economic processes actually in place lead us to think that rural development will aim at a deeper consideration of such quality but, from another point of view, the present rural sector and the legislative situation, actually show how the rural socio-economic system face a substantial difficulty in recognising and exploiting this opportunity. Only a scientific reflection and a political activity more attentive towards the environment will ensure a modern and more mature rural planning activity, able to valorize the environmental quality. For the so-called Third World Countries, the creation of rural economies has been considered as an essential passage to guarantee better social quality for the community. Going towards the concept of rurality means favouring the conditions for a gradual passage from almost exclusive agricultural economies to mixed economies forms, or passing from poor and precarious systems supported by agro-forestry and zootecnical activities, to local economy systems that don’t exclude the agricultural sector, and are enriched with handicrafts, credits, commerce, institutions, transports, health systems, education activities ect...; in other words all the constituents that enhance an integrated economy.