Comparative study on rural proofing in Spain, Bulgaria, Ireland, and Estonia : Final report
| dc.contributor.author | Põder, Anne | |
| dc.contributor.author | Kiisk, Taavi | |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2025-07-13T16:06:21Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2025-07-13T16:06:21Z | |
| dc.date.issued | 2025 | |
| dc.description.abstract | The overall aim of the comparative study was to compare the current state of rural proofing as well as ways to better integrate the consideration of rural needs into policy planning and implementation in the Bulgaria, Estonia, Ireland, Navarre region (Spain) that are partners in Coop4RuralGov project. The survey used a mixed methods approach combining document review, a questionnaire survey of rural policy stakeholders and focus groups for data collection. The four countries in the study (Bulgaria, Estonia, Ireland, and Spain) are at different stages in the development and implementation of their rural proofing mechanisms. Ireland and Estonia have developed specific rural proofing guidelines for national-level policies, and rural proofing should be conducted if the initial screening of a draft policy or strategy indicates that it may have a differential impact on rural areas. However, the application of rural proofing has been inconsistent, and there has been no regular data collection to monitor its implementation. Spain legislated the requirement for rural proofing with a law passed in 2022, and the Foral Community of Navarre is in the process of developing its own legislation. Bulgaria has not established a dedicated rural proofing framework or legislation, and regional impacts are assessed within the broader framework of Regulatory Impact Assessment (RIA). The questionnaire survey was an expert survey targeting rural policy stakeholders, who are involved in the development and implementation of rural and regional policies, programs, and initiatives, as well as in assessing their impacts and/or participating in stakeholder consultations at the national, regional, or local level. 208 responses were collected from the four countries on the stakeholders’ the experiences, perceptions, and challenges related to rural proofing. The respondents represented a diverse mix of stakeholder types and policy levels, with varying experience in policy development, implementation, and consultation processes. Their involvement was strongest in the early stages of policy drafting, while fewer had experience with monitoring, ex-post impact assessment, or specifically assessing rural or regional impacts. Respondents in all four countries agreed that the current policy-making and planning processes have not adequately addressed rural needs, and over half reported that they often or always encounter policies and programs that fail to consider rural circumstances and needs. The common examples of this were the policies and programs related to infrastructure and service provision (particularly public transport, road networks, digital and emergency services, healthcare, and social welfare); the energy and environmental policies and measures, urban-centric planning and housing policies (notably in Spain and Ireland), and governance and funding mechanisms. Stakeholders demonstrated strong support for measures such as raising awareness among policy-makers; deeper rural stakeholder engagement, and integration of rural impact assessments into policy design. The survey revealed widespread recognition of the importance of rural proofing, but it also highlighted major gaps in awareness of whether and how it is implemented, even in countries like Estonia and Ireland that have rural proofing guidelines in place. Two-thirds of respondents were familiar with the term “rural proofing,” but most were unsure or indicated that it is not actually implemented in their countries. In respondents’ experience, rural proofing, when conducted, was mostly applied in early policy stages using stakeholder engagement events and checklists, and the impact assessment focused on impacts on rural populations, jobs, and businesses, specific social groups and transportation. However, few could name concrete examples where rural impact assessment had meaningfully influenced policy change. There was strong support for making rural 6 proofing mandatory, particularly at the national level, but key barriers included limited public sector interest, lack of follow-up, and insufficient skills and knowledge. Opinions on stakeholder engagement in the policy process indicated that current practices are often inadequate. Engagement tends to be concentrated in the early stages of policy processes, but this also varies between countries. Many respondents noted that consultations often occur too late, are hindered by a lack of skills, and fail to influence final decisions. Effective rural proofing requires access to robust, detailed, and regularly updated data and analytical capacity to provide good input to policy-makers, yet existing practices do not fully meet these needs. Key challenges include lack of collection of sufficiently granular level for meaningful comparisons, lack of regular collection, timeliness of the data, fragmented data sources. The discussions in the four focus groups focused on how to proceed. The Bulgarian stakeholders emphasized the need for mandatory rural proofing legislation, development of guidelines and support tools, capacity building, and institutional support, noting that current assessments are too broad and lack local specificity. In Estonia, the focus was on increasing awareness, clarification of “rural”, improving data quality, development of clear metrics, building local capacity for meaningful impact assessments beyond checklists and demonstration of successful models. Irish stakeholders prioritized decentralized, community-based decision-making with mandatory rural proofing supported by dedicated budgets, better interdepartmental coordination. Spanish stakeholders emphasized the need to foster bottom-up and local rural governance, incl. through technical and administrative support, development of toolbox, enhancing rural representation in decision-making bodies, simplifying administrative procedures, adjusting funding formulas, establishing specialized state agency to improve policy evaluation and coordination. Some examples of innovative good practices demonstrated in the project included the use of existing data, such as the municipal web portal minuomavalitsus.ee in Estonia; AI-based tools in Ireland; stakeholder engagement initiatives, such as the Public Participation Network in Ireland and the G30 project’s expert groups; and virtual tools, such as an online module in New Zealand. The main policy recommendations from the survey included: • Make rural proofing mandatory and systematic, starting a national level with clear legislation and guidelines supported by enforcement and voluntary regional/local application. • Establish a monitoring system with assigned responsibilities, and create a practical, accessible toolbox with guidance, digital tools, and good practice examples and detailed demonstration of cases on how it has been applied in practice. • Clarify the scope and principles of rural proofing distinct from rural policy outcomes. • Strengthen data and analytical capacity by leveraging already existing public databases, improving their interoperability, and developing advanced analytical (incl. AI) and visualization tools. • Ensure meaningful stakeholder engagement through established procedures, transparent communication, and effective feedback mechanisms, supported by sustained resources and stakeholder network management. • Raise policymakers’ awareness and capacity via top-down political commitment, bottom-up community support, training, outreach, and networking to build buy-in for rural proofing. | eng |
| dc.description.sponsorship | INTERREG Europe. Co-funded by the European Union. | eng |
| dc.identifier.citation | Põder, A., & Kiisk, T. (2025). Comparative study on rural proofing in Spain, Bulgaria, Ireland, and Estonia : Final report. Estonian University of Life Sciences. https://doi.org/10.15159/EDS.REP.25.01 | eng |
| dc.identifier.uri | http://hdl.handle.net/10492/10082 | |
| dc.identifier.uri | https://doi.org/10.15159/eds.rep.25.01 | eng |
| dc.publisher | Estonian University of Life Sciences | eng |
| dc.rights | Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) | eng |
| dc.rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess | eng |
| dc.rights.uri | http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ | eng |
| dc.subject | rural proofing | eng |
| dc.subject | comparative study | eng |
| dc.subject | Spain | eng |
| dc.subject | Bulgaria | eng |
| dc.subject | Ireland | eng |
| dc.subject | Estonia | eng |
| dc.subject | research report | eng |
| dc.title | Comparative study on rural proofing in Spain, Bulgaria, Ireland, and Estonia : Final report | eng |
| dc.title.alternative | INTERREG project: Cooperation for Rural Governance* Rural Proofing. Cooperation for better sparsely populated rural, coastal and mountain focused governance (Coop4RURALGov) | eng |
| dc.type | Report | eng |
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