Small- and medium-sized enterprises play a key role in our economies and societies, especially in rural areas. They are also critical to attract and maximise the benefits of inward FDI. But SMEs were hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic, and vulnerabilities have been exacerbated by inflationary pressures, disruptions in global supply chains and financial market volatility, which threaten the recovery. Moreover, SMEs in rural areas face additional challenges of remoteness to markets, and more restrictive access to labour and capital. This session will focus on the challenges of developing SMEs in rural areas as well as the opportunities that can be leveraged on in light of on-going mega-trends, and consider policy measures to address these challenges and exploit opportunities.

Food systems include the production, processing, retailing and delivery of food. Different policy levers influence food systems including agriculture, rural development, environment and public health. Thus there is a need to integrate them to ensure coherence and effective outcomes. This session will discuss synergies between food systems and rural development and policy responses that can ensure coherence.

Rural communities face challenges related to demographic decline and ageing, employment and training opportunities, access to public services and weaker infrastructure. In some rural communities, the social economy has developed solutions to mitigate these challenges This session will highlight these innovative ways of delivering positive social and economic outcomes in rural places, and illustrate social innovation processes and social enterprises.

Ireland’s rural development policy, Our Rural Future, provides a blueprint for the economic, social, environmental and cultural development of rural Ireland for the period 2021-2025. It is a holistic forward-looking policy that addresses the main challenges facing rural communities and the many opportunities to improve well-being standards and quality of life for rural citizens in Ireland. This session will present the implementation of this new policy and showcase other national rural policy frameworks from OECD countries.

The COVID-19 pandemic underlined the importance of delivering effective health services in rural communities. Rural proofing involves the systematic application of a rural lens in health services to ensure rural needs, contexts, and opportunities are considered. This joint OECD/World Health Organisation session will involve public and private authorities to discuss rural proofing initiatives for health services. It will consider the main opportunities and challenges and effective partnerships needed to support rural proofing for health services.

Improving social inclusion at national and local levels is a central priority for OECD member countries. Yet efforts to achieve social inclusion require commitment from all levels of government and strong partnerships with the private and third sector. In rural places, policies to foster social inclusion must consider rural characteristics of remoteness and low density. This panel will discuss initiatives across rural places from OECD countries to increase social inclusion.

The COVID-19 crisis and the recent war in Ukraine have brought new challenges to rural places, in particular related to food and energy security. In addition, rural places must also address structural transformations brought by globalisation, urbanisation, ageing, migration, population decline, the production revolution, digitalisation climate change and other transformative trends, such as remote working. This session will identify policies that can help jump-start a more equitable and diverse landscape of resilient rural economies to enable them to thrive and better respond to short and long-term shocks.

COVID-19 has accelerated the digitalisation of working and social interactions. Remote working brings a number of benefits to rural places including the potential to reduce transport-related greenhouse gas emissions, greater flexibility for workers, reduced costs for firms and opportunities to attract skilled workers. Yet not all rural places have benefitted from virtual forms of interaction due to gaps in digital infrastructure and digital skills across places, workers and firms. National and subnational governments can play a decisive role to make the most of remote working. This session will discuss initiatives to help rural communities take advantage of remote working and tackle emerging challenges.

Rural communities across OECD countries often struggle to attract and retain young people and support them in their ambitions. How can rural communities better meet the needs of this younger generation and provide the economic opportunities and quality of life they desire? This session will discuss strategies to improve the attractiveness of rural places for young people.

The bio-economy produces and converts renewable biological resources and waste streams into value-added products, such as food, feed, bio-based products as well as bioenergy. It has the potential to reduce carbon emissions and support the sequestration of carbon in soils, biomass and, ultimately, bio-based products. The circular bio economy aims to transition from our current, linear, economic system to a more sustainable production and consumption model that has the potential to address food loss and waste; biodiversity loss; climate change; land use change and resource scarcity. This session will discuss policies and initiatives to help overcome challenges and implement strategies that leverage the circular and bio-economy.

Young people are the future of rural communities. It is vital that their views are heard and understood as part of rural development policy-making so that rural communities are attractive places for them to grow up and plan their futures. This panel will hear from young people from different rural backgrounds about their experiences, their views on youth participation in rural communities, and ways in which young people can be supported to have their voices heard. This session features a youth panel and they will discuss these topics and more.

The drivers for innovators and public policies to lead innovation in a rural context are not well understood and fully exploited. The OECD’s Enhancing Rural Innovation Initiative aims to unlock this knowledge to help rural areas improve their prospects for development and support reforms to shift rural policies to placed-based innovation beyond a subsidy and sector specific approach. In this session, two publications from the Rural Innovation Initiative will be launched: - Unlocking Rural Innovation - Enhancing Innovation in Rural Regions: Switzerland