4.6 Rural

Oxfordshire is the most rural county in the South East of England, and has the lowest density of population. This contributes to the high quality of life, but offers particular challenges in providing services and maintaining communities.

Rural exclusion in the County, brought out in the Oxfordshire Farming Study (1999), has some striking characteristics:

• Almost 1 in 5 rural people live on low incomes.
• Shortage of affordable and social housing.
• Low pay and low benefit take-up rates.
• Often poor access to services, such as a GP surgery or a general store (50% of rural parishes have no village shop).
• 14% of rural parishes have no public transport service.
• 75% of rural parishes do not have a daily bus service.
• A sense of isolation and stress in many communities.
• Low visibility, with the result that rural issues are harder to remedy.

The social and economic impact of Foot and Mouth disease, the aspirations of the Government’s Rural White Paper (Our Countryside: the future - A fair deal for rural England) in 2000 and the restructuring of rural agencies following the Haskins Review of rural delivery (2003), have underlined the situation.

There has been an increasing emphasis on rural issues in Oxfordshire and interested partners, such as the Oxfordshire Rural Community Council (ORCC) which seeks to support facilities and services, such as village shops, rural housing enablers and community transport, the District and County Councils have come together with representatives from environment and business, as the Oxfordshire Rural Forum to take this agenda forward in a more focussed way.

A number of initiatives to assist rural communities are available, including European Funding (Leader+) to support the quality of life for people living in rural communities and the SEEDA funded programme to support small rural towns across the region.

Whilst advice and support is available to many rural-based businesses, it is not widely communicated. An online Advice Directory developed by the Oxfordshire Rural Forum has been designed to overcome this by supplying information on initiatives such as DEFRA’s Farm Business Advice Scheme and the Rural Business Advice and Training Network.

Major changes are being embraced within the sustainability agenda, such as the reform of the Common Agricultural Policy and the encouragement of local foods and bio-fuels. This is significant in the development of Oxfordshire’s rural economy and is set to have positive effects in the long term, provided that rural communities receive support and time to adapt.

Major changes are being embraced within the sustainability agenda, such as the reform of the Common Agricultural Policy and the encouragement of local foods and bio-fuels.