Limitations to assess the impact of rural development policy in the Puglia region: the case of measure 121 – axes I

Abstract

In this work, some specific aspects of the Rural Development Plan of the Puglia Region (in Southern Italy) for the period 2007-2013 are analyzed and the limitations characterizing the possibility of building an analysis framework aimed at understanding how it actually affects the regional agricultural system are highlighted. More specifically, by referring to a specific measure of the rural development program (Measure 121 of Axes I), the aim is to verify whether the investment activity implemented has actually generated some positive results which can induce us to say that the EU budget devoted to rural development is well spent. In order to achieve this purpose, the authors of the present work have worked at gathering all the information available at the Puglia Region Authority. Nevertheless, this is not helpful for the type of the analysis the authors would like to conduct. The observation of the gathered data, in fact, makes the authors observe the existence of severe limitations deriving from the way in which the Regional Authority manages the data collection. The main aim of this work is to present a framework of analysis which might be used for policy evaluation purposes and to discuss what should be further required for a useful completion of the dataset with the aim of making it the subject of empirical analyses.