Challenges in achieving sustainability in Iberian rural areas and small towns: Exploring immigrant stakeholders’ perceptions in Alentejo, Portugal, and Empordà, Spain

Migration and the reconfiguration of rural places: The accommodation of difference in Odemira, Portugal

“…Whereas rustic properties often represent a new interest in agricultural investment, supported by the recent expansion of water retention and irrigation support infrastructures, in the case of Alentejo, urban properties involve more diversified uses (housing, commerce, industry or services). In Alentejo Litoral, and in Odemira, one can find the highest values of transacted properties, showing the repositioning of these areas in the context of broader “framing territories” (Morén‐Alegret et al, 2018). In fact, both new farming land and new residences (including several of the lifestyle migrants and others) are the result of the structural changes associated with the repositioning of Portugal and, certainly, of Alentejo coastal area and Odemira, in food specialisation and human diversity inherent to the globalisation process.…”

“…Farmers, agribusiness corporations, labourers, lifestyle migrants and non‐farming residents hold different visions of how the land should be managed (Woods, 2011). Conflicts become more palpable if environmental regulations pertaining to natural parks and protected sites are enforced (Morén‐Alegret et al, 2018). In places where intensive farming and nature's conservation dispute natural resources (land, water, air and landscape), the role of state agencies and local authorities in regulating the use of the rural environment is crucial to find a balance between private and public interests (Kristensen, 2016).…”

“…Moreover, the local economic and social diversification has brought to the fore a set of conflicts of interest resulting from the growing complexity of trying to reach compatibility between public agencies and private enterprises. The public interest is represented by the government sphere and the territorial planning and management instruments (the Municipal/Local Authorities, the Alentejo Coordination Commission, 11 the Natural Park, the Agriculture and Ecologic Reserves, the Management Plan of the Coastal Fringe and Odemira's Local Territorial Plan) that endeavour to impose limits, for environmental and social reasons, to the “new intensive farming” businesses sponsored by national and transnational investments (Morén‐Alegret et al, 2018; Taboadela et al, 2018).…”

Accessibility of Services in Rural Areas: Southern Moravia Case Study

“…In extreme cases, there is a risk of the depopulation of the countryside [18] and the extinction of some rural settlements as places of permanent housing. Sometimes, immigrants are seen as rescuers [19]. From the rural point of view, it is possible to consider the sustainability of the countryside as a rural space and the change of the countryside into a kind of urban-rural continuum under the pressure of urbanization processes.…”

Rural Temporary Migrant Workers: Adjustment and Integration in Portugal

“…This situation has led to an inevitable change in Portugal's social, economic and political fabric, as the country has become a multiethnic and multicultural state (e.g., Fonseca, 2008;Marques, 2007). It has also seen an increase in the number of foreign immigrant employers, while the number of Portuguese native employers has not risen (Esteves, 2017;Morén-Alegret et al, 2018). Such cultural diversity has generated some new challenges, in particular the "acquisition of cultural competences that allow a better understanding of the values, practices and social norms connected to new waves of immigrants" (Malheiros, 2011, p. 11).…”