All regions in Lebanon witness economic development and none is left unattended by the state

Reduce social inequalities and build an equitable Lebanese society

A Prosperous Economy That Creates Jobs For All and Reduces Inequalities

1.Regional development has a triple signification:

• In developing countries, development aims at correcting distortions between sectors of exportation and the rest of the slower economic sectors
• Development has also a social component, steering the disparities of wealth between people in such countries
• Finally, development is geographical, trying to contain inequalities between regions, especially between rural and urban regions

2.In Lebanon, regional development is mainly understood in the third geographic dimension

1.% share of total unemployment

2.Main health indicators

3.Main education indicators

4.Internet coverage

5.Regional budgets

6.Number of development projects per region

7.Results of neighborhood feedback surveys

1.The imbalance of regional development in Lebanon includes a division between Beirut and its regions, as well as an urban-rural imbalance

• The discrepancies in development currently indicate a hierarchy placing Beirut and Mount Lebanon at the highest level, followed by other urban poles (Saida, Zahleh, Tripoli) then rural areas at the lowest (Akkar, Hermel, Baalbak)

2.The Lebanese population is divided along three types of residential groupings. The first is formed by groups of less than 5,000 people and constitutes 40% of the Lebanese population, the second is groups of between 5,000 to 10,000 people who make up about 10% of the population, and the last group is composed of cities above 100,000 people that make up 51% of the population (80% of which are in Beirut and its suburbs)

3.Connection and access to potable water, sewage and electricity networks are unequally distributed across regions

4.The establishment of Lebanon in 1920, under the French mandate, combined the poorer areas of the North (Akkar), the Beqaa (Baalbak-Hermel) and the South (Jabal Aamel) with the relatively affluent cities of Mount Lebanon

5.The civil war provoked three types of mutations in spatial organization: first, the destruction of buildings and infrastructures; second, the fragmentation of urban structures and decentralization of spaces and activities into confessional territories forming unequal new centers; third, the urban extensions of cities and the formation of suburbs

6.The current imbalance of regional development is also partly due to post-war reconstruction that focused the majority of projects in Beirut and on the coastal strip

1.The lack of regional authorities at the level of qaza’s capable of initiating development plans; the only existing local authorities are municipalities, but half of the Lebanese territory does not have municipal representation

2.Economic and productive sectors are concentrated in or near large cities (Beirut, Tripoli, Zahleh, and Saida), and the growth of medium sized centers is not being facilitated

3.Political factors contribute to the imbalance of the regional arrangements, as sectarian tensions often prevent the redefining or integration of boundaries on the basis of demography and geography rather than on the grounds of sectarianism and elections stakes as they currently are

4.Leaders of public institutions encourage establishment of state services in the capital and in mohafazat centers

5.Rural-urban migration pushes demographic growth from small villages and cities towards Beirut and other mohafazat centers

1.No master development plan for Lebanon has been adopted; planning policies are only limited to the management of urban services

2.The post war development policy of the State (1992-1998) included projects that were predominantly concentrated around Beirut, largely ignoring other regions.

3.The portion bestowed to rural areas and to agricultural regions of the 10-year plan did not exceed one-third of the planned reconstruction expenses, although these zones form 80% of Lebanon and group almost half of its population

4.NGOs and municipalities development projects in the regions

Policy Action

1.Promote administrative decentralization and the creation of regional authorities on the levels of qaza. Such authorities would be specialized agencies aiming at developing their region comprehensively

2.Redefine the boundaries of the actual administrative regions on the basis of demography and geography, and not on the sole grounds of sectarianism and elections stakes

3.Implement the digitization program (high-speed Internet and 5G) and provide Internet access to every home and institution

4.Broaden the powers of municipalities in financial and developmental areas and automate the administrative services

5.Implement the rapid public transport program in cooperation with international institutions

6.Set up a regional waste treatment plan based on sorting and recycling, instead of adopting incinerators, and develop “green energies”

7.Upgrade the water supply network, rationalize consumption, and use modern irrigation techniques in all regions