Rural Road Transport and Socio-Economic Development in Developing Countries: A Geographer’s Viewpoint

Abstract

Apart from promoting access to agricultural inputs and markets, transport also contribute to socio-economic progress of rural areas in developing countries by providing access to basic facilities like health and education among others. Therefore, improvement in transport is expected to result in improved production, access to employment as well as to income and basic facilities. There is o doubt that there is very close relationship between transport and development and it is expected that if there is a well developed transportation system the economy will be invigorated. However, the actual nature of this interaction is still a subject of debate in the academic community. Therefore, in addition to examining transport development models that attempt to generalize this relationship; this chapter dwells on the debate on the possible relationship that can exist between transport and development. It further uses empirical evidences from different parts of the developing world to bring out the impact of rural road transport on socio-economic development, focusing on agricultural production and income and on access to basic facilities. These are believed to be good indicators for measuring progress in rural areas of the developing world.