a term paper on rural development

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A critical review of rural development policy of Ethiopia: access, utilization and coverage

• Diriba Welteji   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-0857-3885 1  

Agriculture & Food Security volume  7 , Article number:  55 ( 2018 ) Cite this article

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Agriculture is the mainstay of Ethiopian economy involving major source of employment and gross national product. By African, standard rural development programme has long history in Ethiopia. It has also enjoyed a considerable attention by the government. However, the expected level was not achieved. The main objective of this review is to indicate the policy gaps in terms of access, utilization and coverage of rural development policy programme packages by different segments of people in rural areas. The programme packages of rural development policy of the country were reviewed over the past three regimes. It was indicated that there were significant gaps in access, utilization and coverage due to wrong policy priority, institutional and technological variables.

When many African countries have shown limited commitment to supporting smallholder agriculture and when many neglected agricultural extension services in particular, the government of Ethiopia invested in both. On average, the share of national budget devoted to agriculture in the sub-Saharan Africa fell from 5.5% in 1993 to 3.8% in 2000. However, due to the commitment of heads of states in Maputo in 2003 to allocate 10% of their budget to agriculture and a recovery of attention to agriculture, Ethiopia is one of the eight countries to meet the target allocating 15% of the budget over the decade of 2003/2004–2012/2013 [ 1 ].

Agriculture is the backbone of the Ethiopian economy. This particular sector determines the growth of all other sectors and consequently the whole national economy. It constitutes over 50% of the gross domestic product (GDP), accounts for over 85% of the labour force and earns over 90% of the foreign exchange [ 2 ]. On average, crop production makes up 60% of the sector’s outputs, whereas livestock accounts for 27% and other areas contribute 13% of the total agricultural value added. The sector is dominated by small-scale farmers who practice rain-fed mixed farming by employing traditional technology, adopting a low-input and low-output production system. The land tilled by the Ethiopian small-scale farmer accounts for 95% of the total area under agricultural use, and these farmers are responsible for more than 90% of the total agricultural output [ 3 ].

According to Roling [ 4 ], rural development policies and programmes are usually developed to suit the condition of progressive farmers. Knowledge and awareness about the relative importance of each package component to overall yield give farmers room for flexibility in stepwise adoption of the technology, according to their conditions and resources. Development agents, extension professionals, subject matter specialists, farmers’ representatives, politicians and researchers tend to contact only them. Policy makers and donor agencies have so far been emphasized the use of modem farm technologies as a sole source of agricultural growth in Ethiopia. However, the cost of modern technologies is so prohibitive that few farmers in limited areas of the country are so far reached. Therefore, it is high time to explore possibilities for identifying approaches that could complement existing strategies of growth [ 5 ].

The country has varied agro-climatic zones. The government extension programme lists these as: areas of adequate rainfall; areas of moisture stress; and pastoral areas. Farmers traditionally classify them as dega (cool), woina dega (temperate) and qolla (low land; warm climate). This diversity makes it a favourable region for growing a variety of crops [ 6 ].

The rural development in Ethiopia has a relatively longer history than many sub-Saharan African countries. It has also enjoyed increasing government support over years, though not to be in the level expected. Review of the evolution of the Ethiopian rural development policy under different political systems reveals the significance of prevailing policies and development strategies on the contribution to agricultural development [ 7 ].

Under the Imperial Era, development policies favoured industrial development, neglecting the agricultural sector and worked mainly with the better-off and commercial farmers in and around major project areas. During the 1974–1991 periods, however, the political environment favoured collective and state farms at the expense of individual farmers. Distorted macroeconomic policies, political unrest and massive villagization and settlement programmes undermined the contribution that the rural development policies could have made. The post-1991 period is also marked with the most prominent and enduring economy-wide strategies as Agricultural-Led Industrialization (ADLI), the Sustainable Development and Poverty Reduction Program (SDPRP), Participatory and Accelerated Sustainable Development to Eradicate poverty (PASDEP) and successive growth and transformation plans (GTP I and II). These strategies intend, among others, to attain food self-sufficiency at national level by increasing productivity of smallholders through research-generated information and technologies, increasing the supply of industrial and export crops and ensuring the rehabilitation and conservation of natural resource base with special consideration of package approach [ 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 ].

Ethiopian agriculture has been suffering from various external and internal problems. It has been stagnant due to poor performance as a result of factors such as low resource utilization; low-tech farming techniques (e.g. wooden plough by oxen and sickles); over-reliance on fertilizers and underutilized techniques for soil and water conservation; inappropriate agrarian policy; inappropriate land tenure policy; ecological degradation of potential arable lands; and increases in the unemployment rate due to increases in the population [ 12 ].

Agriculture progresses technologically as farmers adopt innovations. The extent to which farmers adopt available innovations and the speed by which they do so determine the impact of innovations in terms of productivity growth. It is a common phenomenon that farmers like any other kind of entrepreneurs do not adopt innovations simultaneously as they appear on the market. Diffusion typically takes a number of years, seldom reaches a level of 100% of the potential adopters population and mostly follows some sort of S-shaped curve in time. Apparently, some farmers choose to be innovators (first users), while others prefer to be early adopters, late adopters or non-adopters [ 13 ].

Despite the fact that many areas of the economy have made progress, the livelihoods of small-scale farmers are still constrained by many impeding factors. The salient constraints include: small and diminishing farm lands due to large family sizes and rapid population growth; soil infertility with decreasing yield-per-hectare ratios; on-field and post-harvest crop pests; unpredictable patterns of rain; input scarcity and outdated technologies leading to low outputs; shortage of capital; reduced market access; lack of market information; outbreaks of animal diseases and shortages of animal feed; and declining price structures [ 6 ].

The methodology followed in this work is time frame critical review of rural development policy of Ethiopia implemented over a long periods of time by different regimes and the achievements compared among the regimes based on the policy instruments adopted accordingly and the total sum of gaps over a long period since its inception in terms of access, utilization and coverage. The objective of this paper is to assess success stories, lessons learnt and loopholes of the past rural development policy of Ethiopia in terms of access, utilization and coverage.

The possible questions of this review are:

Were the rural development policy packages of the country accessible to different segments of society?

Was there any gap of utilization and coverage of the technologies?

What were the rural development models implemented so far in the country?

Were the implemented rural development models in the country appropriate?

Literature review

Theories of agricultural development policies.

Following Ruttan [ 14 ], and Hayami and Ruttan [ 15 ], the literature on agricultural development can be characterized according to the following models: the frontier; the urban industrial impact; the diffusion; the high pay-off; the induced innovation; and the conservation. In what follows, we will review only those models which are more relevant to the conditions of Ethiopian agriculture.

The frontier model or the resource exploitation model involves an approach to agricultural growth through the expansion of the area cultivated or grazed. The southward movement of population throughout most of Ethiopian history demonstrates the importance of the frontier model in that country. However, there are few remaining areas in Ethiopia today where development along the lines of the frontier model would represent an efficient source of growth. The importance of the frontier model in Ethiopia is reduced mainly by limitations in physical availability of land in the temperate highlands. However, it is possible that government policies and institutions are contributing factors, as the World Bank noted in its recent country report on Ethiopia [ 5 , 16 ]. Besides, the ever-growing population pressure over land may not allow the average size of the operational holding to expand in the highlands where more than 80% of crop production takes place.

The high pay-off model, which is also known as “the transformation approach” or “the quick-fix approach”, is based upon investment designed to expand the diffusion and adoption of the high-yielding varieties. In Ethiopia, an attempt was made to partially introduce this model (along with the diffusion model) in the Comprehensive Package Project areas, where it had a strong impact, in particular in Chilalo district of Arsi region. However, the large-scale adoption of this model has been constrained by factors such as: the inability of the public and private sector research institutions to produce new and location-specific technical knowledge; the inability of the industrial sector to develop and produce new technical inputs; the weakness of the extension facilities and related institutions to diffuse the new techniques; the inadequacy of the infrastructure to facilitate the diffusion of the new inputs; the inability of peasant farmers to acquire new knowledge and use new inputs effectively; and lack of complementary inputs such as irrigation facilities which are needed to make fertilizers and modern varieties more effective [ 5 ].

The conservation model of agricultural development, according to Ruttan [ 14 ], “evolved from advances in crop and livestock husbandry associated with the English agricultural revolution and the notions of soil exhaustion suggested by the early German chemists and soil scientists. It was reinforced by the application to land of the concept, developed in the English classical school of economics, of diminishing returns to labour and capital”. The essence of this model is explained by the evolution of a sequence of increasingly complex land- and labour-intensive cropping systems, the production and use of organic manures, and labour-intensive capital formation in the form of drainage, irrigation and other physical facilities to more effectively utilize land and water resources [ 14 ].

The strength of this model emanates primarily from the fact that “the inputs used in this conservation system of farming (the plant nutrients, animal power, land improvements, physical capital and agricultural labour force) were largely produced or supplied by the agricultural sector itself” [ 14 ]. The importance of this point in poor countries such as Ethiopia is obvious. As underlined by Ruttan [ 14 ], “the Conservation Model remains an important source of productivity growth in most poor countries and an inspiration to agrarian fundamentalists and the organic farming movement in the developed countries”.

The major factors which make this model highly relevant to Ethiopian agriculture are: the fact that Ethiopia is unable to make widespread use of existing technological backlog due to, mainly, the high costs of generation and diffusion of new techniques of production; the possibility that the improvement approach involves cost-effective techniques of production and capital formation as it is based upon the use of the relatively abundant and that it could delay the operations of the law of diminishing returns as land is saved through labour intensification; and the fact that soil conservation programmes need special attention as the resource base of the agricultural sector is being depleted at an alarming rate due to the fact that the soil erosion and desertification process continue almost unabated [ 17 , 18 ].

Practices and history of rural development policies in Ethiopia

Development Plan has been documented since the 1950s in Ethiopia. During the period 1950–1974, the political arena was characterized by absolute monarchism. In the economic sphere, markets were the driving forces in resource allocation. Overall, GDP increased on average by 4% per year. The rate was higher than the 2.6% of growth in population [ 2 ].

According to Dejene Aredo [ 5 ], agriculture was also discriminated against by sectoral policies. The First Five-Year Development Plan placed emphasis on raising foreign exchange earnings by improving coffee cultivation, accounting for over 70% of foreign exchange earnings. Similarly, the Second Five-Year Development plan added to its priorities the establishment of large-scale commercial farms and neglected cereal production from subsistence farmers which accounted more than 80% of the cultivated area in the 1950s and 1960s. However, shortages of food in the late 1960s shifted the attention of policy makers to agriculture and priority was given in the Third Five-Year Plan without modifications to the overall growth strategy.

During the 1974–1991 periods, however, the political environment favoured collective and state farms at the expense of individual farmers. Distorted macroeconomic policies, political unrest and massive villagization and settlement programmes undermined the contribution that the rural development policies could have made. The post-1991 period is also marked with expansion of the development programmes [ 11 ]. The most prominent and enduring economy-wide strategy to guide development effort has been Agricultural-Led Industrialization (ADLI), the Sustainable Development and Poverty Reduction Program (SDPRP), Participatory and Accelerated Sustainable Development to Eradicate poverty (PASDEP) and successive growth and transformation plans (GTP I and II). These strategies intend, among others, to attain food self-sufficiency at national level by increasing productivity of smallholders through research-generated information and technologies, increasing the supply of industrial and export crops and ensuring the rehabilitation and conservation of natural resource base with special consideration of package approach [ 8 , 9 , 10 ] (Table  1 ).

As indicated in Table  1 throughout the phases, the interventions are not accessed by all segments of the society, limited to certain geographical areas in terms of coverage and constrained by different institutional factors.

During the imperial regime, emphasis was placed on raising foreign exchange earnings by cash crops and the establishment of large-scale commercial farms and neglected cereal production from subsistence farmers which accounted more than 80% of the cultivated area. During the 1974–1991 periods, however, the political environment favoured collective and state farms at the expense of individual farmers. Distorted macroeconomic policies, political unrest and massive villagization and settlement programmes undermined the contribution that the rural development policies could have made. Moreover, concerns shifted by large towards increasing productivity of smallholders to attain food self-sufficiency at national level through research-generated information and technologies, increasing the supply of industrial and export crops and ensuring the rehabilitation and conservation of natural resource base. However, population growth, environmental degradation, climate-related decline of yield, low level of farm input innovation, capital constraints are among the pressing constraints.

Compared to other sub-Saharan Africa, Ethiopia has an admirable record of supporting agriculture; the continued state-led policies to boost agricultural production, but understanding of the complex issues involved, evidence-based analysis and policy recommendations, and continuous debate on the pros and cons of alternatives options are required. Continued public engagement in input markets and extension services, and participation of private investment in providing goods and services for smallholders in a potentially efficient manner should be encouraged. Overall assessment of the access, utilization and coverage of the technological packages of rural development in the country was not realized although there were significant attentions across regimes.

Abbreviations

Agricultural Marketing Corporation

Agricultural Input Supply Corporation

Agricultural Input Supply Enterprise

Ministry of Agriculture

Minimum Package Program

Peasant Agricultural Development Program

Participatory Demonstration and Training Extension System

National Agricultural Extension Intervention Program

Transitional Government of Ethiopia

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Rural Development

Related sdgs, end hunger, achieve food security and improve ....

Description

Publications.

As the United Nations Secretary-General, Mr Ban Ki – Moon noted in the Millennium Development Goals Report 2015 , “ disparities between rural and urban areas remain pronounced ” and big gaps persist in different sectors:

• It is estimated that in 2015 still roughly 2.8 billion people worldwide lack access to modern energy services and more than 1 billion do not have access to electricity. For the most part this grave development burden falls on rural areas, where a lack of access to modern energy services negatively affects productivity, educational attainment and even health and ultimately exacerbates the poverty trap.
• In rural areas, only 56 per cent of births are attended by skilled health personnel, compared with 87 per cent in urban areas.
• About 16 per cent of the rural population do not use improved drinking water sources, compared to 4 per cent of the urban population.
• About 50 per cent of people living in rural areas lack improved sanitation facilities, compared to only 18 per cent of people in urban areas.

Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 2 of the Post-2015 Development Agenda calls to “ end hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable agriculture ”. In particular, target 2.a devotes a specific attention to “ Increase investment, including through enhanced international cooperation, in rural infrastructure, agricultural research and extension services, technology development and plant and livestock gene banks in order to enhance agricultural productive capacity in developing countries, in particular least developed countries ".

Background information

Promoting sustainable agriculture and rural development (SARD) is the subject of chapter 14 of Agenda 21 .

The major objective of SARD is to increase food production in a sustainable way and enhance food security. This will involve education initiatives, utilization of economic incentives and the development of appropriate and new technologies, thus ensuring stable supplies of nutritionally adequate food, access to those supplies by vulnerable groups, and production for markets; employment and income generation to alleviate poverty; and natural resource management and environmental protection.

The Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD) first reviewed Rural Development at its third session in 1995, when it noted with concern that, even though some progress had been reported, disappointment is widely expressed at the slow progress in moving towards sustainable agriculture and rural development in many countries.

Sustainable agriculture was also considered at the five-year review of implementation of Agenda 21 in 1997, at which time Governments were urged to attach high priority to implementing the commitments agreed at the World Food Summit , especially the call for at least halving the number of undernourished people in the world by the year 2015. This goal was reinforced by the Millennium Declaration adopted by Heads of State and Government in September 2000, which resolved to halve by 2015 the proportion of the world's people who suffer from hunger.

In accordance with its multi-year programme of work, agriculture with a rural development perspective was a major focus of CSD-8 in 2000, along with integrated planning and management of land resources as the sectoral theme. The supporting documentation and the discussions highlighted the linkages between the economic, social and environmental objectives of sustainable agriculture. The Commission adopted decision 8/4 which identified 12 priorities for action. It reaffirmed that the major objectives of SARD are to increase food production and enhance food security in an environmentally sound way so as to contribute to sustainable natural resource management. It noted that food security-although a policy priority for all countries-remains an unfulfilled goal. It also noted that agriculture has a special and important place in society and helps to sustain rural life and land.

Rural Development was included as one of the thematic areas along with Agriculture, Land, Drought, Desertification and Africa in the third implementation cycle CSD-16/CSD-17 .

A growing emphasis is being placed on the Nexus approach to sustainable rural development, seeking to realize synergies from the links between development factors such as energy, health, education, water, food, gender, and economic growth.

In this regard and as part of the follow up to the 2012 Conference on Sustainable Development or Rio+20 , the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN-DESA) , in collaboration with SE4All , UN-Energy and the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) , organized Global Conference on Rural Energy Access: A Nexus Approach to Sustainable Development and Poverty Eradication , in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, Dec 4 – 6, 2013.

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Multistakeholder Dialogue on Implementing Sustainable Development

• January 2015 SDG 2 SDG2 focuses on ending hunger, achieving food security and improved nutrition and promoting sustainable agriculture. In particular, its targets aims to: end hunger and ensure access by all people, in particular the poor and people in vulnerable situations, including infants, to safe, nutritious and sufficient food all year round by 2030 (2.1); end all forms of malnutrition by 2030, including achieving, by 2025, the internationally agreed targets on stunting and wasting in children under 5 years of age, and address the nutritional needs of adolescent girls, pregnant and lactating women and older persons (2.2.); double,by 2030, double the agricultural productivity and incomes of small-scale food producers, in particular women, indigenous peoples, family farmers, pastoralists and fishers, including through secure and equal access to land, other productive resources and inputs, knowledge, financial services, markets and opportunities for value addition and non-farm employment (2.3); ensure sustainable food production systems and implement resilient agricultural practices that increase productivity and production, that help maintain ecosystems, that strengthen capacity for adaptation to climate change, extreme weather, drought, flooding and other disasters and that progressively improve land and soil quality (2.4); by 2020, maintain the genetic diversity of seeds, cultivated plants and farmed and domesticated animals and their related wild species, including through soundly managed and diversified seed and plant banks at the national, regional and international levels, and promote access to and fair and equitable sharing of benefits arising from the utilization of genetic resources and associated traditional knowledge, as internationally agreed (2.5); The alphabetical goals aim to: increase investment in rural infrastructure, agricultural research and extension services, technology development and plant and livestock gene banks , correct and prevent trade restrictions and distortions in world agricultural markets as well as adopt measures to ensure the proper functioning of food commodity markets and their derivatives and facilitate timely access to market information, including on food reserves, in order to help limit extreme food price volatility.
• January 2009 CSD-17(Chap.2B) CSD-17 negotiated policy recommendations for most of the issues under discussion. Delegates adopted by acclamation a “Text as prepared by the Chair,” including all negotiated text as well as proposed language from the Chair for policy options and practical measures to expedite implementation of the issues under the cluster. The text included rising food prices, ongoing negotiations in the World Trade Organization (WTO) on the Doha Development Round, and an international focus on the climate change negotiations under the auspices of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.
• January 2008 CSD-16 (Chap. 2B) CSD-16 and CSD-17 focused on the thematic cluster of agriculture, rural development, land, drought, desertification and Africa. As far as CSD-16 is concerned, on this occasion delegates were called to review implementation of the Mauritius Strategy for Implementation and the Barbados Programme of Action for the Sustainable Development of Small Island Developing States and the CSD-13 decisions on water and sanitation. A High-level Segment was also held from 14-16 May, with nearly 60 ministers in attendance.
• January 2000 CSD-8 As decided at UNGASS, the economic, sectoral and cross-sectoral themes under consideration for CSD-8 were sustainable agriculture and land management, integrating planning and management of land resources and financial resources, trade and investment and economic growth. CSD-6 to CSD-9 annually gathered at the UN Headquarters for spring meetings. Discussions at each session opened with multi-stakeholder dialogues, in which major groups were invited to make opening statements on selected themes followed by a dialogue with government representatives.
• January 2000 MDG 1 MDG 1 aims at eradicating extreme poverty and hunger. Its three targets respectively read: halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proportion of people whose income is less than $1.25 a day (1.A), achieve full and productive employment and decent work for all, including women and young people (1.B), halve, between 1990 and 2015, the proportion of people who suffer from hunger (1.C).
• January 1996 Rome Decl. on World Food Security The Summit aimed to reaffirm global commitment, at the highest political level, to eliminate hunger and malnutrition, and to achieve sustainable food security for all. Thank to its high visibility, the Summit contributed to raise further awareness on agriculture capacity, food insecurity and malnutrition among decision-makers in the public and private sectors, in the media and with the public at large. It also set the political, conceptual and technical blueprint for an ongoing effort to eradicate hunger at global level with the target of reducing by half the number of undernourished people by no later than the year 2015. The Rome Declaration defined seven commitments as main pillars for the achievement of sustainable food security for all whereas its Plan of Action identified the objectives and actions relevant for practical implementation of these seven commitments.
• January 1995 CSD-3 The Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD) first reviewed Rural Development at its third session, when it noted with concern that, even though some progress had been reported, disappointment is widely expressed at the slow progress in moving towards sustainable agriculture and rural development in many countries.
• January 1992 Agenda 21 (Chap.14) Agenda 21 – Chapter 14 is devoted to the promotion of sustainable agriculture and rural development and the need for agricultural to satisfy the demands for food from a growing population. It acknowledges that major adjustments are needed in agricultural, environmental and macroeconomic policy, at both national and international levels, in developed as well as developing countries, to create the conditions for sustainable agriculture and rural development (SARD). It also identifies as priority the need for maintaining and improving the capacity of the higher potential agricultural lands to support an expanding population.

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Rural Growth Requires More Housing

• Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics
• University of Illinois

Housing availability and affordability is a crucial issue facing both rural and urban communities. Communities that can provide an array of housing options are better positioned to attract and retain workers and families. In many communities, however, housing options are limited both in terms of affordability and type. The insufficient supply of housing partially explains why housing costs are one of the key factors driving inflation . Given relatively slow population growth and aging population, many midwestern communities struggle to expand and/or update their housing stock.

This article will first highlight several housing challenges—identified in a recent University of Illinois study on rural vitality—that face rural midwestern communities. It will then examine the geographic distribution of new residential housing construction. This analysis will draw primarily on the U.S. Census Bureau’s Building Permits Survey .  The final 2023 Building Permits Survey (released in early May 2024) provides county-level building permit statistics for new, privately-owned, residential construction. Among other things, these data show where new homes and housing units will be built.

Many factors contribute to regional housing challenges

For many rural economic and community development leaders, housing issues remain a high priority. As part of recent study examining rural vitality in northern and central Illinois, many community leaders were quick to note that many residents cannot find housing that meets their budget, needs, or standards (White, 2024). [1] Figure 1 shows how community leaders in northern and central Illinois responded to survey questions about their local housing market.

Almost two-thirds of survey respondents believed that that finding an affordable home within their region was difficult, particularly for renters, and almost 60% of survey respondents believed that their community lacked a variety of housing options (e.g., single-family, multi-family). This leaves first-time home buyers, or people with more modest incomes, with fewer options and can hinder their ability to build equity through the housing market. In addition, less churn in the housing market can further limit supply and lead to a more degraded housing stock.

Several factors contribute to the lack of available and affordable housing. For instance, labor shortages in the building trades and the unpredictable cost of building materials have limited new home construction and home renovations. As a result, builders often focus more on developing larger, more expensive homes that deliver better returns on their investment. Stakeholders also noted that many homes are sold before even making it to the market, which further limits the of number of homes available to current or prospective new residents. In some rural communities, the lack of assisted living facilities also suppresses turnover as many older residents stay in their homes longer than they would prefer. The longer elderly residents stay in their homes, the more likely those homes will need extensive maintenance and rehabilitation when they do make it market (Asche, 2018). Other factors (e.g., restrictive zoning, land availability, etc.) further limit new housing development, but it’s also important to note that these housing challenges are not limited to just northern and central Illinois. Communities around the Midwest and other parts of the country face similar challenges, and the next section will explore the geographic distribution of new private residential housing construction.

The lack of new home construction is especially pronounced in the Midwest

Coming out of the pandemic, many urban and rural regions in the Midwest and Great Plains experienced relatively slower population growth and this has continued impact new housing development (White, 2023). The U.S. Census Bureau’s Building Permits Survey uses building permits data to show where future housing construction (of both single-family and multifamily units) will occur. Figure 2 shows the number of newly authorized privately-owned residential housing units per 10,000 residents among midwestern state (broadly defined). [2]

These trends often mirror demographic trends. The slowest growing midwestern states are also those building the fewest residential housing units. With few exceptions (e.g., South Dakota, Nebraska, and Minnesota), most midwestern states are not keeping pace with the nation as a whole. Illinois—whose demographic challenges are well known—lags behind both the nation and the Midwest as a whole. Among the 50 states and the District of Columbia, Illinois only surpassed Alaska and Rhode Island in terms of newly permitted units per 10,000 residents.

Just as these trends vary between states, Figure 3 shows that they also vary within states. Significant new home construction in metro areas throughout the southeast and Texas, as well as the intermountain west, mirror population growth trends (White, 2023). There are also relatively high numbers of newly permitted residential units in parts of the Midwest such as Columbus, Des Moines, Madison, and suburban Indianapolis and St. Louis, among others. Nevertheless, new residential construction lags significantly in many parts of Illinois, Kansas, Missouri, and Ohio—particularly in their more rural counties.

Farm dependent counties have particularly slow new residential building construction

The economic characteristics of different communities can also influence new home construction. Examining these trends through the lens of the USDA Economic Research Service’s County Economic Types [3] highlights several additionally patterns (Figure 4). Most notably, the rate of newly permitted residential units was significantly less was in farm dependent counties, than in other county types. In addition to shrinking and aging populations, other contributing factors have limited new home construction in farm dependent counties. In some agricultural communities, for instance, the value of land for agriculture exceeds the value of land for housing development—particularly for housing that meets the needs of first-time homeowners or rental properties.

Mining dependent, government dependent, and nonspecialized counties more closely follow the national trend. By contrast, significantly more housing is coming online in recreation counties, where over 70 private residential units have been permitted per every 10,000 residents. This figure is even higher (90.1 permitted units per 10,000 residents) in counties considered retirement destinations. This includes many parts of Florida and Arizona, but also smaller midwestern areas such as the Branson and Lake of the Ozarks regions in Missouri. These relatively high amenity communities can attract wealthier residents who can afford more expensive housing. In some instances, these new units represent seasonal or second homes. These homeowners may often use these units as short-term rental properties (e.g., Airbnb, Vrbo, etc.). While this may support the local tourist industry, this new construction does little to address local housing challenges.

More expansive housing options are necessary for future development

Affordable and accessible housing can significantly influence the ability for communities to attract and retain residents—and importantly workers. Providing more housing, and housing options, is an important element for slowing the outmigration that exacerbates the workforce challenges facing midwestern communities. Addressing these issues, however, often requires intentional action. After years of rising housing costs, the City of Minneapolis reviewed their zoning rules in the early 2000s and subsequently took steps—such as encouraging apartment development on commercial corridors and allowing duplex and triplex construction on all residential lots—that encouraged greater housing development (Liang, Staveski, and Horowitz, 2024). These policies have helped Minneapolis expand its housing supply at a faster rate than many other midwestern cities.

Nevertheless, housing issues remain important for all communities, and especially those in more rural, farm communities where new home construction has lagged, and communities struggle to meet the housing needs of their residents and workforce. In these instances, local communities might explore programs to address derelict or distressed properties. Such investments can limit the deterioration of the existing housing stock, which can also stabilize property values to the benefit of the local tax base. Rural communities might also consider efforts to promote more diverse types of residential housing (e.g., multi-family, rental) that sometimes face opposition from existing residents and homeowners. Regardless, no one strategy—nor one local or regional actor—can solve community housing challenges. Rather, communities must work collaboratively on multiple strategies to effectively address these issues (National Association of Development Organizations Research Foundation, 2024).

[1] This study—conducted by the University of Illinois and sponsored by Compeer Financial —took place primarily in Fall 2023. This study included a survey of economic and community development leaders in rural northern and central Illinois that received roughly 200 responses. We also engaged with over 145 area residents through a series of individual conversations, focus groups, and several community meetings. Throughout this project, we asked community leaders to consider the issues that spurred new opportunities and sparked greater vitality (e.g., increased entrepreneurship, remote work, volunteerism, etc.), as well as those that prevented communities and residents from truly thriving (e.g., lack of appropriate housing, limited childcare options, etc.). A report summarizing the findings of this work is available on the University of Illinois Extension Community and Economic Development website .

[2] The U.S. Census Bureau’s Building Permits Survey uses building permits data to show the buildings, units, and valuation of new, private, residential construction. The subsequent graphics focus on the construction of new units. I normalized these data—using the Census Bureau’s 2023 population estimates—in order to better compare states, counties, and county types of different sizes.

[3] USDA ERS’ 2015 County Typology Codes classify all U.S. counties into six mutually exclusive categories of economic dependence—farm dependent, government dependent (which often includes counties with large state universities), manufacturing dependent, mining dependent, recreation counties, and nonspecialized counties. Nonspecialized counties are often found in more urban metro areas. More information about the county typology codes can be found on the USDA ERS website: https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/county-typology-codes/

Asche, K. “ The workforce housing shortage: Getting to the heart of the issue .” Center for Rural Policy and Development, April 2018.

Liang, L., Staveski, A., and Horowitz, A. “ Minneapolis Land Use Reforms Offer a Blueprint for Housing Affordability .” Pew Charitable Trusts, January 4, 2024.

National Association of Development Organizations Research Foundation. “ Solving the Regional Housing Puzzle: Economic Development Districts as Regional Housing Changemakers .” 2024.

White, M. " Post-Pandemic Population Trends in the North Central United States ." farmdoc daily (13):84, Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, May 9, 2023.

White, M. Rural Vitality in Northern and Central Illinois . Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, January 2024.

Disclaimer: We request all readers, electronic media and others follow our citation guidelines when re-posting articles from farmdoc daily . Guidelines are available here . The farmdoc daily website falls under University of Illinois copyright and intellectual property rights. For a detailed statement, please see the University of Illinois Copyright Information and Policies here .

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Guest Essay

Biden Wants to Send Billions to Rural America. But This Must Happen First.

By Tony Pipa

Mr. Pipa is a senior fellow at the Center for Sustainable Development at the Brookings Institution.

President Biden regularly emphasizes how the major pieces of legislation he has signed — the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, the CHIPS and Science Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act — expand opportunities for Americans.

This is especially true for rural Americans. Those three laws appropriated billions of dollars — about $464 billion — that is particularly relevant to rural communities, allowing them to dream of a different economic future.

I am often asked if rural voters will give Mr. Biden credit for all that money and the changes it could bring, and will show their appreciation at the ballot box. My answer is that it is unrealistic to expect place-specific investments to have an immediate impact on elections.

Rural places remain skeptical that federal policymakers have their best interests at heart. Proving otherwise will take intention and time.

Above all, implementation matters. These investment opportunities will be meaningless unless they reach rural America. For that to happen, federal and local officials, and many people in-between, will need to focus on intentional targeting and sensitivity to the challenges that rural places face.

It is important to keep in mind that many rural governments are led by unpaid elected officials, and few rural city halls have staff to work on planning, project development and grant writing.

Only 15 percent of Michigan’s smallest jurisdictions , for example, express confidence in their ability to access federal grants — whereas the rate for jurisdictions over 30,000 people is close to 40 percent. A national survey published in 2019 found more than half of rural counties experienced moderate or significant fiscal stress, so for programs where local governments must match the federal funding, those counties face an additional challenge.

This does not bode well for equitable distribution of those federal investments. According to analysis I did with a fellow researcher, just 2 percent of the appropriations in the bills are reserved exclusively for rural places. Accessing the remainder means vying successfully with larger jurisdictions.

The demand among rural and small towns clearly exists. For two new programs geared toward energy improvements in remote and rural communities under 10,000 people, the Department of Energy received more than 1,000 submissions combined. The new Recompete pilot program , intended to enable economic renewal in distressed places and overseen by the Economic Development Administration at the Department of Commerce, received a similar deluge of 565 applications — the most applications the E.D.A. has received for a national program in its history. About half of the geographic areas that were eligible are rural.

The scale of interest compounds the challenge. These and other programs’ popularity, combined with rural communities’ limited resources, means that success rates will be exceptionally low. It highlights the importance of leveling the playing field so the most vulnerable communities are not left out.

A critical first step will be to make sure that local communities have the staff and access to the expertise and administrative capacity necessary to secure and manage these investments.

As the Biden administration makes major investments in creating technical assistance centers in communities across the country, rural places must get to participate and benefit.

Congress also has a vital and continuing role to play. The Rural Partnership and Prosperity Act is bipartisan legislation that has been proposed in the Senate and the House of Representatives , and it is now included in the negotiations for the 2024 Farm Bill . Such a measure could be a game changer in getting flexible support directly to rural partnerships so they can unlock these opportunities.

The processes and requirements to access those investments could also be simplified — no one should be required to fill out a 400-page application. We’ve already seen some improvements. The administration has put so-called navigators in selected communities to help them identify funding opportunities, and some agencies like the U.S. Forest Service have modified their processes to help communities apply for grants. These advances ought to be more widely adopted across the federal government.

States or financial and nonprofit intermediaries will also have the final say on the fate of much of the investment that is important for rural places, like broadband and water .

It’s not just about access to these opportunities. The extent to which local communities are in the driver’s seat, and how widely the benefits accrue beyond local elites, will be instrumental in avoiding the extractive practices that have often haunted rural economies. This means taking the time and providing the chance for local people to influence the decisions that will affect them.

Take rural Humboldt County, Calif., where plans are underway to put immense wind turbines off its coast, a clean energy installation large enough to provide 6 percent of the state’s supply of electricity. A decision is still pending by a state agency as to whether any of that electricity will land in Humboldt itself, where some federally recognized Native tribes do not have dependable power to this day.

The biggest risk is that politics stops the momentum created by these laws, because the investments are just getting started. For example, the money has not even begun to flow to local projects from the infrastructure act’s signature $42.5 billion investment to close the broadband gap .

Leading policy voices on the right have proposed dissolving or consolidating agencies like the Economic Development Administration and pulling these resources without offering an alternative vision for supporting rural development. That will simply once again starve rural places of investment. It does not seem like a long-term winning strategy.

Nor does vilifying an entire segment of the rural population based on specious analysis , as parts of the liberal elite seem wont to do.

The struggles that portions of rural America are experiencing were decades in the making. Common sense dictates that the solutions will not transpire overnight. Congress and the Biden administration have put the initial pieces in place to help many rural places transition to a brighter economic future. The president’s campaign pitch to rural voters ought to be the opportunity to stay the course. The political rewards may be far in the future, but it’s the right thing for rural communities — and for the country.

Tony Pipa is a senior fellow at the Center for Sustainable Development at the Brookings Institution, where he leads the Reimagining Rural Policy Initiative and hosts the Reimagine Rural podcast.

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Martin County Commission to developers: 'Tell us what you need, and we'll give it to you'

There's an old Arab proverb about not letting a camel get its nose under a tent, otherwise the rest of the camel will soon follow, crowding out the tent's other occupants.

With our climate and ecosystem in Florida, the analogy works better with an alligator than a camel, but the principle is the same.

Last week, the Martin County Commission not only decided to let the proverbial gator stick its snout into the tent, commissioners essentially dropped a bag of chicken parts in the center of the tent and said: "Here. Go nuts."

By a 4-1 vote, with Sarah Heard dissenting, commissioners agreed to allow the so-called "rural lifestyle" land use to be applied to projects more than a mile outside the county's designated urban service areas .

Suburban development in rural areas

These are called urban service areas for a reason. They are the parts of the community identified as having suitable infrastructure ― like roads, water, sewer and safe access to emergency services ― needed to support intense growth. The areas outside the boundaries don't have that infrastructure.

Under the change approved last week, if a proposed development is at least 3,000 acres, it can be designated as a rural lifestyle project even if it's up to 6,000 feet beyond the urban services boundaries.

At the same meeting, the commissioners also approved The Ranch, which will include homes, two golf courses and natural preserves on a 3,900-acre tract that ― surprise, surprise ― falls within that 6,000-foot buffer area.

The commission majority had signaled it would do this by giving preliminary approval to the land-use change and the accompanying developmen t last December, but the brazenness of taking this step during a year when at least a couple of commissioners will be running for re-election is still jarring.

The project's supporters argued many more homes could be built with the existing zoning than the 175 planned for The Ranch.

Reasons for land-use change requests aren't altruistic

That's not necessarily true. First, not all land is developable due to wetlands, topography or other factors. Most land outside of the county's urban service areas is zoned for agricultural uses, which allows no more than one home for every 20 acres. There is a zoning designation within the county's code called "rural ranchette" that allows quadruple that density, up to one home per 5 acres.

(Incidentally, one unit-per-5 acres is supposed to be the maximum average density for rural lifestyle projects.)

So, in theory, developers could just request property be rezoned for rural ranchettes instead of the supposedly more-restrictive rural lifestyle. But they aren't doing that. And in spite of what some would like us to believe, they aren't refraining from taking that step out of the goodness of their hearts.

Maybe they don't believe individual ranch homes, set apart from each other on 5-acre tracts, would sell for as much as homes configured closer together, with high-end amenities like the golf courses and natural areas nearby.

Be assured they can make more money with the rural lifestyle zoning than they could without it, or else they wouldn't be pushing so hard for it.

Driving up real estate prices seems counterintuitive

Yes, there could be fewer rooftops in a rural lifestyle project than what hypothetically could be built in the western lands under other types of agricultural zoning. That's not necessarily a great thing for county residents, though.

If rural lifestyle projects like The Ranch or the previously approved Atlantic Fields development continue to proliferate in the western county, the area will soon be filled with enclaves of multimillion-dollar homes.

Like the rising tide that lifts all boats, real estate prices elsewhere in the county will continue to increase as a result, driving up housing costs for lower- and middle-class folks.

Property values might go up anyway if the area keeps its current agricultural zoning, although probably not as much as if these rural lifestyle projects allow developers to create hideaways for the likes of Tom Brady or Tiger Woods .

Making housing in Martin County less affordable seems like the exact opposite of what the community needs, but we haven't even gotten to the worst part yet.

When will commissioners ever say 'no' to developers?

The worst part is, Heard aside, the commissioners have shown absolutely no interest in pushing back against whatever developers want. Commissioners are apparently comfortable letting the proverbial gator thrash around under the tent flaps to its heart's content.

When commissioners created the rural lifestyle land use in 2022, it was supposed to be done on an experimental basis. County officials were allegedly going to wait and see how the change would impact rural and suburban growth patterns.

However, before the inaugural Atlantic Fields project was built, developers for The Ranch requested an amendment to greatly expand the amount of territory where rural lifestyle projects could be done.

Rather than taking an analytical approach, it was more convenient to just give The Ranch developers what they requested. So, as Heard asked, what's next?

What amendment will developers seek to accommodate the next project to come down the road? Whatever they need, or think they need, or just would kind of like to have, you can bet this commission majority is going to give it to them.

The commissioners seem not to care at all what local residents think. Maybe they're counting on constituents being unaware or apathetic about how developers, some of whom don't even live in the community, are running the show.

Commissioners Ed Ciampi and Doug Smith have announced plans to run for new terms, while Harold Jenkins so far has not. In all three cases, there are other candidates running for seats currently held by commissioners who've been waving developers' projects through like prom queens on parade.

If voters don't send a message at the polls this year, there's no reason to expect the commissioners will change their behavior.

Send them a message.

This column reflects the opinion of  Blake Fontenay . Contact him via email at  [email protected]  or at 772-232-5424 .

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