Public Policies for Rural Development: Circular Deals, Digital Revolution, and Inclusive Engagement

Dear Colleagues,

Rural areas provide food and resources that contribute to jobs, growth, and prosperity and help to maintain cultural heritage. They are also home to a wide variety of flora and fauna, wildlife, and natural environments. Above all, they are places where local communities live and work and are sources of innovation and social and economic activity. Modern rural policies must meet important challenges and stimulate a new revolution in order to foster changes in quality of life; boost the efficient use of resources by moving to a clean, circular economy; restore biodiversity; cut pollution; and accelerate our transition to a sustainable food system.

The Special Issue aims to be part of the debate on the future of rural areas and the role they have to play in our society in local economies and in the creation of a sustainable food systems and bioeconomy.

The bioeconomy covers all sectors and systems that rely on biological resources (animals, plants, micro-organisms, and derived biomass, including organic waste) and encompasses the production of renewable biological resources and the conversion of these resources and waste streams into value added products, such as food, feed, bio-based products, and bioenergy (European Commission, 2018)

The goal of the (bio)circular economy is to change philosophies and lifestyles fostering a cooperative-community user (using and re-using product value and function), which is in contrast to a consumer culture (only using physical products) (Korhonen et al., 2018).

In the framework of the EU Green Deal, the EC (2019) made public the "Farm to Fork strategy”, which intends to address the challenges related to the sustainability of food systems, recognizing the connections that bind the health of individuals, societies, and the environment. This strategy is based on six macro-objectives, which deal with the sustainability of food production, food safety, sustainability of processing and supply chains, promotion of sustainable food consumption, reduction of food losses and waste, and the fight against fraud in food supply chains.

In order to reach these new challenges, the youth population plays a crucial role in transforming food systems and rural areas in a dynamic way. Therefore, investing in young people can deliver significant results in terms of poverty reduction, improvement of rural areas, employment generation, inclusive engagement, and food and nutrition security.

The LEADER approach is also proving its value as a versatile tool for rural policy, offering the chance to involve local communities and authorities in positive transformation. Regional policies offer an opportunity to prepare well-tailored solutions, taking into account bottom-up initiatives.

We invite articles that creatively analyze the potential of rural areas, document the transformation of human and technical resources, and contribute to the debate on public policy instruments that reflect the directions of change in Europe, especially in light of the ambitious objectives to be climate neutral by 2050. We also welcome articles on rural development pathways and modern policies in different regions of the world.

Prof. Dr. Paweł Chmieliński
Prof. Dr. Mariantonietta Fiore
Guest Editors

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