Many rural areas are undergoing structural changes as jobs in forestry, fishing, mining, agricultural and other natural resource-based industries decline. These communities, often based around these industries, are generally small and located some distance from urban areas. They are faced with decreasing population as residents and their families leave for jobs elsewhere. As a result, the communities and residents are looking for alternative ways to create employment and sustain themselves. Given the nature of these rural locations, many small businesses based there face challenges that are not generally experienced by enterprises in urban areas. Some communities are not accessible by paved road while others are not accessible by road at all, relying instead on water and air transportation. The business people in these areas often operate without standard business infrastructure, which can include telephone lines, broadband Internet, banking services and other items, and can have difficulty accessing supplies, customers, employees and other required materials. However, there has been relatively little research on the challenges facing rural businesses and the specific methods by which these owners mitigate these challenges. Understanding and addressing the challenges faced by these businesses becomes important in order to support and encourage economic growth and development in these rural communities. Building on this context, this research looks to answer the following questions: • Why do people start businesses in rural locations? • What type of businesses do they start? • What challenges do these rural businesses face? • How do owners respond to these challenges? Vancouver Island and the surrounding smaller islands in British Columbia, Canada serve as the research site. Given the exploratory nature of this research, an inductive approach has been selected with the use of case studies, interviews and grounded theory analysis. Purposeful sampling is used with the sample businesses meeting specific criteria, based on location, business size and definition of success. These businesses are interviewed at their locations to allow the researcher to experience the challenges associated with accessing the particular rural community. The interview topics are focused on the above research questions. There are several common characteristics among the sample owners and their businesses. The owners tend to be in-migrants who moved to the rural area for lifestyle reasons. They have started their business to provide an income, take advantage of a business opportunity, or both. Family members, particularly spouses, are actively involved in the business. In many cases, participants supplement their business income with other income sources to ensure business viability. Success is measured generally by personal and lifestyle goals, rather than financial criteria. The businesses face common challenges in terms of a limited local population base which impacts on market size and labour pool, rural location and access to urban centres, gaps in business and social services infrastructure and heavy time demands. The owners respond to these challenges in a variety of ways which includes the involvement of family, core business diversification, alternative income sources, long hours invested in the business and involvement with the community. To meet these challenges and devise their responses, the owners draw upon four key resources – their own skills and attitudes, their family, business and community. The resulting conceptual framework draws together these key resources and suggests that all four must be present to ensure success within a rural context. Each resource is comprised of several components which contribute to business success. The framework also integrates several resource-based theories, which consider the key resources either separately or in pairs, to create a holistic model. The conclusions focus on several key areas. This research contributes to the knowledge base on rural small businesses by creating a framework that draws directly from the experience of these owners and their objectives and motivations for their businesses. It reflects their internal focus and a concentration of the four resources that they access easily from within their domain. This research also suggests some possible roles for government which focus on its role in shaping the larger environment, particularly at the infrastructure level and human capital development. Finally, future research directions are recommended. This study considers a relatively unexplored topic and suggests ways for rural small businesses to address the challenges which they face. With this knowledge, individuals, businesses, communities and other interested organizations can work to achieve their economic development goals.

Submitted by JOSIANE SANTOS DE OLIVEIRA (josianeso) on 2017-09-28T13:48:40Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Samuel Martim de Conto_.pdf: 7491691 bytes, checksum: 80110bf6960d9ac867d4989bbe145ffc (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-09-28T13:48:40Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Samuel Martim de Conto_.pdf: 7491691 bytes, checksum: 80110bf6960d9ac867d4989bbe145ffc (MD5) Previous issue date: 2017-06-30 / Nenhuma / A formação histórica da economia do Rio Grande do Sul está alicerçada na produção primária em geral, com predomínio das pequenas propriedades rurais. Atualmente, a característica do setor industrial gaúcho é distinto da maior parte dos demais Estados do pais, como por exemplo São Paulo. Dessa forma, com o constante aumento da competitividade e tendo no RS o predomínio de micro, pequenas e médias empresas de capital nacional, faz-se necessário compreender as estruturas de apoio no desenvolvimento e introdução de inovações nas empresas. Assim, esta tese teve como objetivo geral compreender a dinâmica de relacionamento das empresas gaúchas com os Sistemas de Inovação Regional e Nacional tendo em vista a promoção da inovação. Para atender ao objetivo de estudo, foi utilizado um procedimento metodológico do tipo pesquisa quantitativa descritiva, através da realização de pesquisa junto à 83 empresas da indústria de transformação, localizadas nas cinco maiores regiões do RS em número de estabelecimentos industriais, a saber: Metropolitano Delta do Jacuí, Paranhana – Encosta da Serra, Serra, Vale do Rio dos Sinos e Vale do Taquari. Foi utilizado o teste não-paramétrico de Kruskal-Wallis para identificar com quais atores dos Sistemas de Inovação as empresas tiveram mais interações nos anos de 2015 e 2016. Os resultados gerais apontaram que as empresas industriais participantes da pesquisa, em relação ao Sistema Nacional de Inovação, a interação está associada com a obtenção de financiamento público através, principalmente, dos atores BNDES, FINEP e Banco do Brasil. Já quanto ao relacionamento das pequenas, médias e grandes empresas gaúchas com o Sistema Regional de Inovação, ocorreram principalmente com o ator Universidades, particularmente as regionais, que tem um amplo conhecimento das necessidades e demandas da região onde atuam. Por fim, são apresentadas sugestões de melhorias no dinamismo dos Sistemas de Inovação, sobretudo, na ampliação das políticas de apoio ao desenvolvimento da inovação no ambiente empresarial, bem como, das fontes de financiamento e agências de fomento voltadas à inovação. / The historical formation of the economy of Rio Grande do Sul (RS) state is based mainly on primary sector with a predominance of small rural properties. Currently, the characteristics of the industrial sector of Rio Grande do Sul are distinct from most of the other states of the country, such as São Paulo for example. With the constant increase in the competitiveness and the predominance of micro, small and medium enterprises with national capital, it becomes necessary to understand the support structures required for the development of innovation into the companies of RS. The general objective of this work is understanding the dynamics of relationship between the companies and the Regional and National Innovation Systems in order to promote innovation. For obtaining the study goals, a descriptive and quantitative research was performed through a survey made in 83 companies from the manufacturing sector, all of them located in the five largest state regions in number of industrial establishments (Metropolitano Delta do Jacuí, Paranhana - Encosta da Serra, Serra, Vale do Rio dos Sinos and Vale do Taquari). Still, the non-parametric Kruskal-Wallis test was made to identify which actors of the Innovation Systems the companies had more interactions in the years of 2015 and 2016, respectively. The general results pointed out that these companies that participated in the survey, in relation to the National System of Innovation, had more interaction associated with the purpose of obtaining public financing through mainly the BNDES (Brazilian Development Bank), FINEP (Funding Authority for Studies and Projects) and Bank of Brasil actors. Regarding to the relationship between small, medium and large companies in Rio Grande do Sul state and the Regional Innovation System, they were mainly universities, particularly regional ones, with a large background of the regional needs and demands where they operate. Finally some suggestions are presented for improvements in the dynamism of Innovation Systems, especially in the expansion of suport policies for the development of innovation in the business environment, as well as funding sources and innovation agencies.

The present thesis aims to increase our understanding of the causes of separatism. The inspiration for this topic comes from the fact that separatist conflicts can become extremely destructive, and thus a better understanding of why they emerge may help us prevent much human suffering by pointing to ways in which separatism can be avoided. More specifically, the thesis aims to explain the link between separatism and regional development disparities. The argument presented is that inter-regional economic conflicts (such as about inter-regional fiscal redistribution) easily emerge between regions at different levels of development, and that under certain conditions, particularly prolonged recessions and austerity, such conflicts can become an important driver of separatist aspirations. This can happen in both poorer and richer regions. The thesis further argues that this entire process can only be fully understood if we analyse society through a class prism. Given that regional development disparities often lie at the root of inter-regional economic conflicts, one of the ways of avoiding such conflicts – and thus also separatism – would be to equalize regional development levels. In order to do so, however, we first need to understand why regional disparities emerge and persist. Focusing on capitalist countries, the thesis argues that the disparities emerge as a natural consequence of the operation of oligopolistic markets, which are the dominant market form in capitalism. Regional development policies are explored at length, and it is argued that they are generally insufficient to overcome the tendency of markets to produce regional disparities. All the topics in the thesis are explored at the general level and for a larger number of countries, but the main in-depth case study is of regional disparities in the United Kingdom and how they relate to Scottish separatism.

This diploma thesis deals with influence of the Kvasiny industrial zone on the development of Rychnovska. This industrial zone is made up of one strategic investor, namely Škoda Auto a.s. with the plant in Kvasiny. The main attention was paid to the economic entities operating in the Rychnov nad Kněžnou district. First, a SWOT analysis of the ORP Rychnov nad Kněžnou and the industrial zones itself was carried out. Subsequently, a questionnaire survey was used, which was used to identify both positive and negative impacts on economic operators operating in the region.