Most research on foreign immigrants has been focused on their arrival in metropolitan areas or the capital cities. However, in certain European regions, international migration into small towns and rural areas is a significant feature and the geographical, socio-economic and cultural backgrounds of immigrants living there are becoming more diverse.

Today, an increasing number of researchers are paying attention to this relatively new issue in the context of migration studies. On 19 October 2006 an international workshop on immigration into small towns and rural areas will take place in Barcelona Autonomous University thanks to funding from the Spanish Ministry for Education and Science and the Catalan Governmental Department for Research and Information Society.

Such International Workshop will bring together academics and other professionals interested on issues like foreign immigrants’ integration processes in small towns and rural areas, international immigration settlement patterns, and urban-rural and rural-rural migration flows.

The main objective of this workshop is to open international spaces for exchanging research results and opinions on the recent evolution and current trends on immigration into small towns and rural areas.