Decentralized Industrialization and Rural Development: Evidence from Taiwan

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After 3 decades of growth, widespread poverty persists in underdeveloped countries. One of the major characteristics of the poor is that a disproportionate number of them are located in rural areas. Since a large number of the rural poor have limited or no access to productive agricultural land, raising agricultural productivity alone may be insufficient to reduce rural poverty. Consequently, attention has now turned to rural nonfarm activities as a possible source of rural employment and income. This paper uses evidence from Taiwan to show that the level of rural nonfarm ac-