Working Group 1.1

The Changing Face of Rural Areas: Labour Immigration to the Countryside

Convenors:
Charalambos Kasimis, Agricultural University of Athens, kasimis@aua.gr
Apostolos G. Papadopoulos, Harokopio University of Athens, apospapa@hua.gr 
Mary Cawley, National University of Ireland, Galway, mary.cawley@nuigalway.ie

In many countries, and particularly in the developed world, rural labour immigration has become a new characteristic of contemporary migratory flows, with far-reaching implications for demography, society, culture and economy over extensive areas. A growing body of research relating to Europe, North America and Australia reveals distinctive components within the immigrant stream. International labour immigration is well established in areas of southern Europe, where intensive cultivation remains important, and is a growing trend in the horticultural and related sectors in northern and Western Europe. Beyond agriculture, with the diversification of rural economies, migrants are finding employment in other sectors, including tourism and other rural services. Many migrants come from outside the EU as well as from the newer member states and there are emerging issues relating to ethnicity, cultural adaptation and social integration, dependent in part on whether migration is seasonal, temporary or longer term.
    
This Working Group seeks to achieve a better understanding of the structure, cause and impacts of contemporary forms of international, work-oriented migration to the rural economy and countryside. Papers are invited under four thematic headings: (i) the demographic impacts of rural immigration; (ii) the implications for the rural economy and countryside of rural labour immigration; (iii) the impacts on the migrants’ original society; and (iv) analyses of relevant migration, employment and welfare policies.
    
Papers that present theoretical readings on these phenomena, as well as the findings of empirical research, are welcomed.