Abstract

With various trends unfolding at different spatial and temporal scales, the extractive industries are increasingly influential in changing patterns of land use, social relationships, local economies and community identities in rural regions. While agriculture has been seen as the essence of rural areas and changes in that sector have been integral to structural change in northern economies and societies, suitably endowed rural areas could be the emerging industrial heartlands and sites of readjustment. This is because of their prominence as sites of extraction of subsurface resources, notably construction materials such as sand, aggregates and stone; industrial minerals such as salts, rare earth elements and phosphate; metals such as iron ore, gold, copper and zinc; and energy sources such as coal, oil, uranium and gas. This chapter focuses on the rural transformations associated with extraction of metals, minerals, coal, oil and gas (collectively termed ‘mining’) and emerging issues for rural studies.