Knowing, examining, ameliorating and developing the rural area, these are all activities of vital importance to a country, by the size of the rural area, expressed through the surface owned, as well as by the population weight occupied in productive activities, of socio-cultural services, of habitat and tourism. In the Report on the European Charter of the rural area, the board of agriculture and rural development of the European Council estimates that the rural area of Europe represents 85% of its total surface and affects, directly or indirectly, more than half of the European population. The rural Rumanian area also includes most of Romania’s surface, having, according to the statistics, a share of 93,7%. The importance of the rural area in Romania can be easily proved through the numerical stability of the rural population during 80 years. Thus, in the 20th century, in Romania, while the total of the country’s population grew by ten million of inhabitants, the rural population maintained, with little fluctuation, around the size of 10 to 12 million inhabitants. With all the rapid urbanization, as a result of the industrialization without precedent in the 21st century, considering the diminution of the occupied population in agriculture, sylviculture and pisciculture (without, however, diminishing also the rural population) and the diminution of the relative share of the agriculture in the internal gross profit, the importance of the rural area must not diminish, but on the contrary, needs to be more and more studied, examined and submitted to a complex development process. The share of the rural population and of the surface occupied by the rural area, as well as the importance of rural life to a country, turn the aspect of the rural development and management into a problem of high proportions and of both national and international importance.
