Land Quality, Development and Space: Does Scale Matter?

Salvati Luca ()
Additional contact information
Salvati Luca: Council of Research in Agriculture – Centre for Plant-Soil Relationships, Via della Navicella 2-4, 00184 Rome, Italy

European Spatial Research and Policy, 2013, vol. 20, issue 2, 99-112

Abstract: This study analyzes empirically the relationship between land quality decline and the spatial distribution of per capita income observed in Italy at different spatial scales and geographical divisions. The aim of this contribution is to verify if a decline in land quality has higher probability to occur in economically disadvantaged areas and if scale may influence this relationship. Per capita income was considered a proxy indicator for the level of socio-economic development and life quality in the investigated area. Changes over time (1990-2000) of a composite index of land quality and per capita income in Italy were regressed at four spatial scales: (i) 20 NUTS-2 regions, (ii) 103 NUTS-3 prefectures, (iii) 784 local districts designed as Local Labour Market Areas (LLMAs), and (iv) 8,101 LAU-1 municipalities. Different specifications were tested, including first, second and third order polynomial equations. Linear models allowed the best fit for data examined at all spatial scales. However, elasticity of the dependent variable to per capita income varied considerably according to scale suggesting that developmental policies may have a limited impact on land quality in vulnerable southern Italian areas compared to northern and central Italy. This study suggests that geographically disaggregated data simulating different spatial levels of governance may offer further insights compared to cross-country datasets indicating targets for multi-scale policies possibly preventing a poverty-desertification spiral.

Date: 2013
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.2478/esrp-2013-0013 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:vrs:eusprp:v:20:y:2013:i:2:p:99-112:n:7

DOI: 10.2478/esrp-2013-0013

Access Statistics for this article

European Spatial Research and Policy is currently edited by Tadeusz Marszał

More articles in European Spatial Research and Policy from Sciendo
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Peter Golla ().