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Rural Vision

Actions for resilient rural areas

Houses on a hill with trees on a green background

Under this action area, rural areas benefit from actions to increase environmental, climatic and social resilience by storing carbon in peatland and wetlands, enhancing soil health and improving prospects for women and vulnerable groups.

The vision must promote sustainable resilience and inclusive development, and enhance the well-being of inhabitants.

Consultation activities for the long-term Vision

Flagship : Support rural municipalities in energy transition and fighting climate change

Flagship: Addressing climate change in peatland areas through carbon farming

Flagship: A soil deal for Europe

Flagship: Promoting social resilience and women in rural areas

Analysing spatial mobility and demographically declining areas in Europe

Three Horizon Europe funded projects from Cluster 2, which started in 2023, will produce new knowledge on the impact of spatial mobility on rural areas.

  • PREMIUM_EUPolicy recommendations to maximise the beneficial impact of unexplored mobilities in and beyond the European Union’, will develop a regional policy dashboard to assist policy makers in vulnerable regions;  
  • MOBI-TWINTwin transition and changing patterns of spatial mobility: a regional approach’, will focus on the impact of global transitions on rural areas;   
  • Re-PlaceReframing non-metropolitan left behind places through mobility and alternative development’, will study the impact of spatial mobility on non-metropolitan left-behind areas

Assessing the working conditions of farm workers

The Commission is conducting a study for 2025 on the working conditions of workers in the agricultural sector that will:

  • assess the general situation of workers;
  • examine how Member States enforce effectively legislation on working conditions;
  • establish a baseline for the future assessment of the new social conditionality mechanism included in the CAP 2023-2027.

Learn more on social sustainability under the CAP 

Supporting the inclusion of migrants in rural areas

As part of the implementation of the Action plan on integration and inclusion 2021-2027, the Commission has explored options to build rural partnerships to promote inclusion and integration of migrants in rural areas:

The Commission will continue to involve rural areas when supporting local and regional authorities for measures related to migrant integration, such as funding for transnational projects under Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund or actions taken in the framework of the Urban Agenda Partnership in the inclusion of migrants.

Several EU funded projects had already addressed migration in rural areas – Discover their work:

Ensuring equal opportunities for rural children

In 2021 the Council adopted a Recommendation establishing a European Child Guarantee (ECG). In line with this recommendation, Member States will work together to establish a common monitoring framework to assess the implementation, including indicators for rural areas.

All Member States have submitted their national action plans for implementation of the ECG, and they are expected to report on the implementation progress in 2024. Most action plans refer to the rural-urban divide in access to key services. This aspect is most prominent in the action plans of Romania, Lithuania, and Croatia who have planned policy measured targeted at children in rural areas.  

Learn more about the European Child Guarantee.

Addressing the needs of people with disabilities

The Commission is implementing the Strategy for the Rights of Persons with Disabilities 2021-2030 in cooperation with the Member States and Civil society, and in particular organisationsof persons with disabilities. The strategy will also support improved access to their rights in rural areas.

These actions pay attention to rural areas:

  • guide for Member States to improve independent living and inclusion in communities, that the Commission is developing;
  • the “disability platform” expert group was created to support stakeholders with the implementation of the strategy, and include a monitoring of the implementation of the actions of the disability strategy;
  • the framework for “Social Services of Excellence for persons with disabilities” that will be presented in 2024.

Learn more about Social protection & Social inclusion

 

Discover the REBOUND project!

REBOUND is a two-year project under the Erasmus+ programme, kicked off on 1 February 2022. It is led by the Technological University of the Shannon (formerly Limerick Institute of Technology, Ireland) working with five partner organisations.

The aim of the project is to improve the resilience of rural communities, by analysing their needs and developing training programmes. These are turned into a pilot available for all.