5th NORDIC-BALTIC CONFERENCE IN REGIONAL SCIENCE
GLOBAL-LOCAL INTERPLAY IN THE BALTIC SEA REGION
Pärnu, Estonia, October 1-4, 1998

Dr. Jörg Pohlan
Institut für Agrarentwicklung in Mittel- und Osteuropa (IAMO)
Magdeburger Str. 1, 06112 Halle, Deutschland
Tel.: 49 345 500 8115    Fax: 49 345 217 6652
E-mail: pohlan@iamo.uni-halle.de

The political breakdown in the Central and Eastern European Countries (CEEC) initiated drastic changes in the economic structure. Transformation as well as the development processes of the CEEC have led to a drastic decline in the number of jobs, especially in the agrarian sector. This decrease in the number of employment opportunities particularly affects the rural areas, as their economic structure is heavily formed by agriculture. In addition, rural areas are often characterised by an insufficient technical and institutional infrastructure.
As a consequence, severe population losses can be observed in the rural areas of many of the CEEC, while at the same time the share of older people is increasing. The out-migration of qualified labour, as well as disinvestments in production capital are causing discriminating factor productivities and socio-economic disparities.
The main objective of the investigation is to identify different types (clusters) of rural areas, each characterised by similar structures and problems, choosing the example of Latvia. Each of these clusters would need a specific scientific and/or political-planning approach, uniform for all local authorities belonging to one cluster. The paper shall therefore attempt to answer the following questions: What types of rural areas can be distinguished that systematically capture inequalities of socio-economic structures, as well as differences in migration processes in the different sections of territories in Latvia? What are the essential space-structural determinants which influence the scale of migration in the different types of areas? The results shall lead to recommendations for target-oriented regional-political measures.