Equity, Growth, and Development: Regional Analysis in Developing Countries

Abstract

Abstract The rural poor in developing countries usually lack physical and economic access to the resources they need to increase their productivity and income. International aid agencies and governments in developing countries seek methods of distributing investments in social services, infrastructure, and productive activities more widely in rural regions; they also seek ways of increasing poor people's access to the towns and cities where those essential resources often must be located. The “urban functions in rural development” approach to regional spatial analysis provides a way of identifying the settlements where such investments can be sited more effectively and efficiently and of integrating the rural and urban sectors of regional economies. UFRD provides essential information to planners and policymakers so that investments can be distributed to create a more geographically equitable pattern of economic and physical development.