Rural Development Division

Mission

RDD focuses on rural people’s livelihood and the relation between the rural sector and other sectors of the economy. The activities carried out by RDD mainly concentrate on: the analysis of the conditions (i.e., factors and mechanisms) that frame rural people’s livelihood, the analysis of policy impact on rural livelihood, and the proposal of policy interventions aiming at improvement livelihood and/or mitigating the adverse impacts of other policies. Moreover, this division is institutionally committed to play a crucial role in defining, monitoring and revising the Syrian agricultural strategy.

Team and Topics

Firas Haydar: Infrastructures and other investments in rural areas (division Chief)

Raid Hamza: Non-farm activities in rural areas, being them related or not to agricultural production

Abeer Munlahasan: The sustainable livelihood approach to rural development.

Widad Shhaideh: Migration and rural-urban relationships.

Samira Soubh: Women’s role in agriculture and related gender issues.

Firas Yassin: Natural resources and the environment, with special reference to water and land issues.

Samira Zougbi: Rural poverty and inequality in rural areas.

The above topic-researcher allocations are meant as a preliminary field of specialization. However, all topics are linked to each other and, therefore, are considered as closed areas but as starting points for looking at rural development. Moreover, it is expected that the topic-researcher allocation will enforce complementarities for undertaking joint research efforts.

Activities and Publications