Governments and Parliamentarians in developing nations need to work harder to help rural communities sustain their livelihood in an increasingly complex landscape, which will help to decrease the divide between urban and rural groups, says the Speaker of the North West Frontier Province in Pakistan.
Mr Khan is the Speaker of the Provincial Assembly of North West Frontier Province (NWFP) in Pakistan. He entered politics after a career in business and community development, and was elected to the Assembly for the Pakistan Peoples’ Party Parliamentarians in March 2008. Mr Khan is also a Member of the CPA Executive Committee.
The environment and urbanization, its correlation and the pace at which urbanization takes place at the cost of contraction in rural life is a dilemma we in Pakistan and almost all devel- oping countries are facing. For this uphill task, it demands
greater attention on behalf of the national and international organiza- tions, governments and other related agencies. It’s a matter of grave con- cern, as it not only creates problems and overburdens our cities but it also deprives us of the rich culture, laurels and history we have carried from our forefathers.
Understanding the urban/rural divide The first thing we need to understand
interested in movement, dynamism, progress and competition. Many theories exist about the
is the very definition of urban and rural themes.
Urban life may relate to city liv-
ing where most of the infrastructure is based around international indus- trial standards, such as the provision of health, education, transportation etc, while rural life is defined by its agricultural structure.The two reali- ties are strong pillars of a nation which are not mutually exclusive. Rather, they co-exist and reinforce each other, but unfortunately, this is not the case.The poverty-stricken population living in rural areas is considered as people who are not
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twofold urban-rural phenomenon. The first real study about the urban- rural mix and dependence described the reliance of many low-income households on both rural-based and urban-based resources in constructing their livelihoods. It also highlighted that this straddling of the rural–urban divide was usually ignored by policy makers, and that the rigid division on the part of sectoral strategies actually made life more difficult for low- income groups, particularly in the rural areas in countries like Pakistan and most of South East Asia. There are many reasons why it has become even less realistic for development specialists to separate into rural and urban camps on the basis of their corresponding interests. The notion of a “divide” has become a misleading symbol, one that over- simplifies and even distorts the reali- ties. It is clear that the linkages and interactions have become an ever more intensive and important com- ponent of livelihoods and produc- tion-delivery systems in many areas – forming not so much a bridge over a