Country profile on rural characteristics Spain - RuDI

6050UrbanSRAESSRRPRAPRR40% 3054482037 36341021143 2 1 8 70Area Population GDP (PPS)AREA POP GDPNote: Data is missing for the Balearic and Canary Islands256 4Figure 2: Percentage Distribution of Area, Population and GDP (PPS) by urbanruralregion type (Fourth Cohesion Report Typology)2.4 National definitions of ‘rural’ and typologies of ruralareasThe traditional Spanish definition of rural areas was based on the number of inhabitantsper municipality. Rural municipalities were those with less than 2000 inhabitants,although in some documents the definition of a category of intermediate municipalitieswith a population between 2000 and 10000 inhabitants can be found. Currently somedocuments and academic studies use other thresholds such as 5000 or 10000inhabitants.Most of the 17 Rural Development Programs 2007-2013 agree that the OECD definitionat regional or NUTS2 level is not appropriated to define Spanish rural areas. However,each region has different approaches in defining rurality. Most of the regions definedrural areas at the municipality level (NUTS 5), or even lower. Among the approachesadopted by the Spanish Autonomous Communities:- application of the OECD criteria as such;- application of the OECD criteria at the municipal level;- adoption of other criteria at the municipal level (e.g. number of inhabitants,population density, structure of ages, land uses, economic structure and others);- adoption of other criteria at sub-municipal level (typology of terrain, totalpopulation, productive specialization).Another typology commonly used refers to Less Favoured Areas (mountain areas, areasunder risk of depopulation and other specific areas). Figure 3 shows the classification ofrural areas for the 17 regional Spanish RDP (2006-13) based on this latter criteria.9