Rural Life Advisor

Wales

Glamorgan

The area spans the Diocese of Llandaff with the Diocese of Swansea and Brecon and Monmouth either side. It also represents seven County Council Unitary Authorities from Swansea to the west, Cardiff to the east and Merthyr Tydfil in the North. Glamorgan has a mixture of upland and lowland farms with predominantly sheep production in the north and dairy and arable farms in the south.

What is a Rural Community?

In 2004, the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) and the Countryside Agency published new definitions for 'rural' and 'urban'. These definitions are based on population figures for each 'settlement' (village, town or hamlet) and the district in which the settlement is located. Population sparsity is now the defining feature of a rural community.

The new definitions for 'rural' and 'urban' were developed for use by funders, policy makers and the Office of National Statistics. Defra admits that an area definition as either rural or urban may conflict with the 'look' or 'feel' of that area from the perspectives of local people.

Traditionally, rurality has been defined by a range of factors, including the rate of land use for agricultural activities. The agricultural landscape is still an important feature of many rural areas, yet only two per cent of the population in England and three per cent in Wales are currently employed in farming.

The Defra/Countryside Agency definitions were developed to encompass the diversity of rural England and Wales in the twenty-first century. Rural areas today include 'honeypot villages' that depend heavily on tourism, urban fringe commuter villages and former coal-mining communities.