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Scotland’s Chief Statistician yesterday published Rural Scotland Key Facts 2012. 

The publication brings together previously published statistics on a range of key policy areas, providing comparisons between remote rural areas, accessible rural areas and the rest of Scotland. The statistics provide a valuable evidence base on issues affecting rural Scotland and a tool to inform the mainstreaming of rural policies.

The publication is grouped into three sections:

• People and Communities - Including data on population changes, age distributions, household composition, experience of crime and neighbourhood likes and dislikes
• Services and Lifestyle - Including data on access to services, travel patterns, educational attainment, life expectancy, house prices, housing quality and rates of fuel poverty 
• Economy and Enterprise - Including data on employment and unemployment rates, industry size, earnings and patterns of work

Some examples of the results contained in the publication are provided below. Comparisons between rural areas (remote and accessible), and the rest of Scotland show that rural areas have:

• a faster rising population than the rest of Scotland and higher rates of in-migration
• higher rates of economically active people and more households where total income exceeds £20,000 per year
• longer life expectancies, fewer emergency hospital admissions and fewer people who smoke
• a higher proportion of people who volunteer in their community and rate their neighbourhood as a ‘very good’ place to live

Rural areas also have:

• more expensive housing stock and a higher rate of households in fuel poverty
• a higher proportion of households spending over £100 a month on fuel for cars
• fewer residents who find key services convenient and who are in close proximity to public transport options
• fewer children who walk or cycle to school and fewer adults using active or public transport to work or education

The definition of remote rural and accessible rural is based on the Scottish Government Urban Rural Classification. Most of the tables and charts are based on the Scottish Government Urban Rural Classification 2009-2010, but where the data was collected in earlier years the corresponding Urban Rural Classification at that time is used.

Related information 

Rural Scotland Key Facts 2012

Information about official statistics