Rural-urban reciprocal interactions & sustainable development in Iran

Rural-urban interaction in sustainable socioeconomic conditions leads to reciprocal and positive performance in the area of economic linkages. Positive effects of this reciprocal interaction include the improvement of employment, income and wealth of generations. In this regard two necessary instruments are rural roads and local and daily markets. Social interactions and their quantity and quality are a quintessential part of human life. Many rural poor in developing countries live in areas far away from markets and isolation is a key limiting factor to their livelihood. Rural roads in developing countries are often seen as the least important linkage of the road transport system. However, these rural roads provide access for countless rural communities and their inhabitants. The lack of accessibility to rural roads has been identified as one of the main causes of poverty among rural people. Also, nowadays we observe transition to local-based food production, distribution and marketing in order to ensure a more sustainable, healthy future of both the planet and humankind. Markets play an important role in rural development, income generation, food security, gender issues etc.