While the rural exodus dominates public and scientific debates, considerably less attention has been given to studying why the overwhelming majority of people worldwide remain immobile. As a consequence of this, the reasons why people stay, especially in economically weaker rural areas, are...

Producer organisations bear great potential to link small-scale farmers to markets. In post-communist economies, historically negative attitudes towards cooperatives are blamed as barriers to collaboration, but little is known about the broader range of motives to (not) cooperate. We use a...

In this study, we augment Ajzen’s Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) with an institutional embeddedness logic to develop and test a mediated model of the effects of perceived corruption on attitudes, social norms and perceived behavioral control, which in turn determine entrepreneurial...

This paper investigates dynamic effects of remittances on households’ poverty and income distribution. Using state-of-the-art matching techniques, we measure impacts based on counterfactual scenarios, and make a step forward by applying for the first time a dose-response function approach to...

A remarkable out-migration from Kosovo occurred after the winter 2014/15, raising urgent questions about its underlying drivers and implications for both Kosovo and the destination countries. This article aims at providing a better understanding of key migration triggers and some particularities...

In the Republic of Moldova, a large number of households that received land shares after the break-down of the collective farm structure currently focus on semi-subsistence agriculture. Often, one or more members of these households have migrated abroad. This paper aims at assessing the impact...

This study assesses the effectiveness of the Subsidy per Head Scheme (SPHS) in increasing milk productivity, land use, herd size and income in dairy farms across the seven regions of Kosovo. SPHS represents one of the largest coupled subsidy programs in the agricultural sector of Kosovo in terms...

The economic wellbeing of a large number of rural Kosovar families depends heavily on migrants' remittances. This paper aims at analysing the impact of migration on rural poverty and inequality in Kosovo. It draws on the 2009 nationally representative Kosovo Remittance Study. Analyses are based...

The well-known EU LEADER programme aims at using the endogenous potential of rural regions and at improving local governance. Especially since the current funding period doubts are rising about whether the programme actually delivers what it promises. Indeed, translating the LEADER approach is a...

The rural out-migration of young people leads to problems such as “brain drain” and the overageing of the rural population. The purpose of this paper is to study return migration motives among students originating from rural areas. The case study relates to the province of Akmola, northern...