Improving the Rural Investment Climate for Businesses : Key to Rural Income Generation

An appropriate rural investment climate (RIC) is essential for rural businesses to be successful and generate employment and income in their communities. Improving the investment climate could facilitate income-generation activities in both farm an...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Sawada, Naotaka
Format: Working Paper
Language:English
en_US
Published: World Bank, Washington, DC 2017
Subjects:
BUS
TAX
Online Access:http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/279561468203676596/Improving-the-rural-investment-climate-for-businesses-key-to-rural-income-generation
http://hdl.handle.net/10986/26897
Description
Summary:An appropriate rural investment climate (RIC) is essential for rural businesses to be successful and generate employment and income in their communities. Improving the investment climate could facilitate income-generation activities in both farm and nonfarm sectors, thus reducing rural poverty. Nonfarm sector focused growth, combined with agricultural growth, and has been shown by Delgado et al. (1998) to have a significant impact on the local economy through the generation of employment and income. This study is the first to focus on both farm and nonfarm enterprises in its 2010 surveys of RIC in Yemen, Burkina Faso, Nigeria, and Mozambique unlike six previous RIC assessment (RICA) pilot projects that focused only on nonfarm enterprises. This report assesses the weaknesses and strengths of all RIC components in farm and nonfarm enterprises of the four countries surveyed, and recommends measures to address the weaknesses. The report identifies similar business obstacles for farm and nonfarm enterprises and four critical areas of the RIC to be improved. The results of the RICA are based on analyses of obstacles perceived by rural entrepreneurs and on assessments by RIC indicators, enterprise entry and exit, and enterprise performance. To have maximum synergy effects, farm and nonfarm enterprises should be promoted together.