ABSTRACT
This conclusion presents some closing thoughts on concepts discussed in preceding chapters of this book. It summarizes the different approaches and interpretations of sustainable development as rural development found in policy programmes and projects. Most of the case studies presented in the chapters of the book demonstrate rather clearly the complicated issues of defining sustainable development, identifying the policy networks to be built for successful projects, and the mechanisms or instruments for policy implementation and evaluation for rural sustainable development. It illustrates the importance to project success of building on, or incorporating into the project, the informal networks in which project participants are involved through their territorial membership. Local knowledge and technologies are becoming interesting again under the objectives of sustainable development. The multi-faceted and heterogeneous social and ecological realities at regional and local levels of rural development allow for a variety of approaches and for approaches that do not require a broad consensus from all the actors involved.
