Typologies of rural areas in EU-27 for spatial analysis : rural labour market approach

Abstract

Rural areas are very different in accordance with spatial, social and economic dimensions. For this reason over 60 various typologies have been developed to determine the basic characteristics of rural areas and support different development policies. The brief review of methodologies for the construction of lypologies in various contexts and existing rural areas lypologies is presented in the paper. A disaggregative approach was adapted to building rural areas typology, under which the well-established statistical techniques were employed. The developed typology was validated using data of EU-27 regions at NUTS3 level and the results are visualised in the map. These results were achieved during the Framework 7 project "New Sources of Employment to Promote the Wealth-Generating Capacity of Rural Communities" (RuralJobs).