The role and function of small towns in rural development using network analysis method case: Roniz rural district (Estahban city, province Fars, Iran)

Problems resulted from the development of the large cities, population density and also immigration of rustics to these cities made planners to pay more attention to reinforcement and development of small towns. It is believed that by strengthening small towns we can change the way of immigration of rustics to larger cities and solve many problems of rural regions resulted from the lack of proper access of rustics to services centers. In Iran by performing the policy of changing villages to cities, many rural regions have been changed to cities especially during the last two decades. The current town of Roniz in Estahban city, Fars province, is one of the towns which have been changed into a town in 1990. The purpose of this paper is to study the role and function of Roniz town as a small civic center in the development of rural regions in its surrounding. In this direction by choosing 5 functions in the form of 20 variables and using network analysis method we have studied and compared the current affairs and relations in the understudied village in two intervals before and after Roniz becomes a town. The results of studies indicates that Roniz town as a central place, have played an important role in giving services to the regions in its surrounding which has consequently caused to reduce the dependence of rural regions to city center.   Key words: Small town, rural development, network analysis, urban-rural relations, Roniz town.