Compared with their fellow citizens in the city, rural residents are more likely to be affected by ecological restoration programs and policies. Yet no one has conducted a large-scale study of how ecological conservation impacts rural livelihoods and the economic status of rural households, especially in China. To fill that knowledge gap, I collected and analyzed relevant data from 2007 to 2018 for western and eastern China. I found that the relationship between western China’s green coverage rate and rural income followed an inverted U curve whereas that between its green coverage rate and urban-rural income gap was instead U-shaped, suggesting that ecological restoration has come to eventually negatively impact the economic welfare of rural residents in western China; however, the complete opposite was found in eastern China. Greater urbanization, financial support, and infrastructure such as education, medical, and Internet services would help to improve the current situation in western China. This suggests the government should take actions—such as improving the quality of farmer training to the rural residents and improving infrastructure construction—to help farmers acquire a new source of income and narrow the urban-rural income gap in parallel to implementing ecological restoration projects.

The coronavirus pandemic has reinforced the need for sustainable, smart tourism and local travel, with rural destinations gaining in their popularity and leading to increased potential of smart rural tourism. However, these processes need adjustments to the current trends, incorporating new transformative business concepts and marketing approaches. In this paper we provide real life examples of new marketing approaches, together with new business models within the context of the use of new digital technologies. Via hermeneutic research approach, consisting of the secondary analysis of the addressed subject of smart rural tourism in adversity of the COVID-19 and 6 semi-structured interviews, the importance of technology is underscored in transforming rural tourism to smart rural tourist destinations. The respondents in the interview section were chosen based on their direct involvement in the presented examples and geographical location, i.e. France, Slovenia and Spain, where presented research examples were developed, concretely within European programmes, i.e. Interreg, Horizon and Rural Development Programme (RDP). Interviews were taking place between 2022 and 2023 in person, email or via Zoom. This two-phased study demonstrates that technology is important in transforming rural tourism to smart tourist destinations and that it ushers new approaches that seem particularly useful in applying to rural areas, creating a rural digital innovation ecosystem, which acts as s heuristic rural tourist model that fosters new types of tourism, i.e. smart rural tourism.

This study explores the feminization of poverty and the dynamics of the care economy in rural areas, focusing on the municipality of Génova, Quindío, Colombia. The novelty of this study lies in its analysis of the compounded effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on women’s economic participation and care responsibilities in a rural context, offering insights relevant to Latin America. This study addresses the critical problem of how increased caregiving responsibilities and labor informality during the pandemic have disproportionately impacted economically active women, exacerbating gender inequalities. The objective is to analyze the relationship between the care economy and feminization of poverty, providing policy recommendations for post-pandemic recovery in rural settings. The methodology consisted of a two-stage approach. In the first stage, a probabilistic stratified sampling design was applied using data from the Colombian National Population and Housing Census and the Génova, Quindío, and Colombia Municipal Panel. In the second stage, fieldwork was conducted with a sample of 347 women using the RedCap application for data collection. The results indicate a significant increase in unpaid domestic and caregiving work during the pandemic, particularly for the elderly, disabled, and children. Additionally, labor informality increased, further limiting economic opportunities for women. The key conclusion is that public policies aimed at reducing gender disparities in rural labor markets must prioritize caregiving support and formal employment opportunities for women. These findings suggest that addressing the care economy is crucial for closing gender gaps and fostering equitable economic recovery in rural Latin American areas.

In a territorial development model such as that of Valencia (Spain), in which limitations, resistance and difficulties are observed as a result of the dualization that it has undergone in these almost 40 years of operation, we ask whether these obstacles have had an effect on the evolution of employment. This is understood as the basic indicator, the primary aim of any action undertaken for development of the territory. To this end, we set out from the methodological articulation of various techniques (survey by means of a pre-coded questionnaire, application of the READI® methodology) based on the primary information collected from the AEDL (Employment and Local Development Agents) technical staff of Valencia province, which showed us their perception of the dualization to which the model is subjected and the difficulties that this generates when carrying out their professional activity. Statistical and documentary sources were also analyzed. With all this, the evolution of employment in these territories over the last five years was studied in order to validate, or not, the initial hypothesis: Whether this reality of the model (duality) responds to short-term or structural parameters.

This paper examines the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on financial inclusion in China, a country with a significant agricultural sector and an evolving digital landscape. The pandemic has accelerated the shift towards digital financial services, underscoring disparities in access. This study explores the pre- and post-pandemic scenarios of financial inclusion in China, evaluates the economic and social impacts of the pandemic, and assesses the role of digital transformation in the financial sector. It also investigates the changing roles of commercial banks and microfinance institutions, the integration of technology in finance, and the development of rural-urban economic linkages. The paper aims to propose strategies to enhance financial inclusion, ensuring it reaches the most vulnerable, and concludes with recommendations for creating a more equitable and robust economic system.