The Guadalhorce Valley region shows great dynamism being a peripheral region. The proximity to Malaga city and the big cities of the coast, as well as the richness of its soils for agriculture and the tourist attraction of the region due to its natural and historical-cultural heritage, are all reasons that lead to opportunities for growth, job opportunities and settlement of the population.
However, there are some elements that still mean that residents of this region have fewer opportunities and resources compared to the urban areas, which still leads many of these people to move to larger cities.
One of the main elements that stands out as a
"brake" for development is the lack of public transport (flexible hours, affordable prices, stops in each suburb and accessibility for
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people with reduced mobility), which prevents mobility between towns and the capital but also between the neighbourhoods of each town and the centre of the locality.
The other element is the lack of openness towards alternative culture, alternative leisure activities, different meeting spaces and different models for youth (innovative entrepreneurship, sexual diversity, cultural and musical openness, etc.).
Job opportunities exist, both for skilled work and unskilled jobs, but there is a lack of decent working conditions (contract for all the hours really worked, dignity of wages, etc.) and training in innovation to apply the knowledge and skills acquired during studies in different jobs oriented to the development needs of the territory
The training and development opportunities are therefore aimed at promoting awareness aobut the value of the resources of the territory, the development of opportunities around the use of natural resources, natural tourist attractions and local products. Also about training in innovative entrepreneurship, incorporation of digital tools for entrepreneurship, services of advice to start new entrepreneurial projects and aid to entrepreneurship that start from the reality of the territory and of the people.
This means for many people and groups of the Guadalhorce Valley the need to facilitate
bureaucratic processes and to support entrepreneurship and small and medium-sized companies through more advisory services that allow a better understanding of the aid processes, subsidies , accreditations for quality labels and application of innovation to business models.
Finally, we must emphasize that the differences between the areas of the region are still very important and that therefore, the reality of towns such as Almogía or Valle de Abdalajís, or neighborhoods in other towns such as El Chorro, Cerralba, Sierra de Gibralgalia , etc. It is not the same reality as that of larger and better communicated municipalities such as Cártama, Alhaurín or Coín.
Therefore, we conclude on the need to pay attention to the local reality of people, to promote a process of empowerment and development that starts with the population and that focuses on meeting local needs and enhancing the strengths of each community, to achieve a real, innovative and close development that entails the permanence and / or return of the population to rural and peripheral areas, which can result in a higher quality of life (better environmental conditions, satisfaction with the proximity to people and towns, cultural wealth, tranquility) and sustainable development.
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R U R A L S A R D I N I A
The rural area that we are going to analyse in this desk research is the whole Sardinian Region as almost all territory could be considered as Rural Area. Excluding the touristic places of the coasts and the main cities (Sassari, Cagliari, Olbia, Oristano, and Nuoro), the remaining Sardinian backgrounding areas could be considered as rural, with similar issues and challenges related to marginalization. Even excluding urbanized and touristic places it’s important to mention that some issues and rural obstacles are reflected in the whole island, cities and urbanized areas as well.
Geography
Sardinia is the second-largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, after Sicily, and one of the 20 regions of Italy. It is located west of the Italian Peninsula, north of Tunisia and immediately south of the French island of
Corsica. It is one of the five Italian regions that have been granted some degree of domestic autonomy by special statute. Its official name is Regione Autonoma della Sardegna (Sardinian: Regione Autònoma de Sardigna;
English: "Autonomous Region of Sardinia"). It is divided into four provinces and a metropolitan city. The capital of the region of Sardinia and its largest city is Cagliari.
Sardinia's indigenous language and the other minority languages spoken on the island (Sassarese, Gallurese, Algherese Catalan and Ligurian Tabarchino) are officially recognized by the regional law as having "equal dignity"
with Italian.
Demography
The Sardinian population is getting older in the last years, natality index is decreasing, and youth are moving away after the studies. This situation is reflected better in numbers: in
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Sardinia at the end of 2019 were resident 1.639.591 with an average age of 46,3 years, in 2000 the average age was 40,1 yr. Most of the population is over middle age plus is not equally distributed in the 24.100 km² of the island. The main concentration of people is in the urban area of Cagliari with a density of 346 inhabitants per km², followed by Sassari province with 64 inhabitants per km², then South Sardinia with 54 inhabitants per km² and Nuoro 37 inhabitants per km². 22.8 % of the population is over 65 years old and 11.2%
is lower than 14 years old. Comparing Sardinia to a similar island as Sicily we can state the inhabitants in Sicily are almost 3 times more, 5 mln against 1.6 mln, and the density is double in Sicily, 196 inhabitants per against the 68.8 of Sardinia.