The Spatial Implications of Rural Adjustment: What is the Policy Agenda?

Abstract

Despite the impression which may be gained from unprecedented farmer demonstrations in the capital cities, ‘rural adjustment’ is not a phenomenon of the 1980s. It is a process which has proceeded vigorously since initial white settlement. The obvious forces driving rural adjustment have varied of course from the pre-eminence of transportation technologies in the early years to the impact of information technologies and growing exposure to international competition (or lack thereof) in more recent eras. Nevertheless, there has developed a clear consistency in terms of the casualties of the process-the smaller towns and the economic, social and cultural networks built around them.