THE IMPORTANCE OF NATURAL RESOURCES IN THE ALBANIAN ECONOMY

Abstact: Natural resources plays a very important role in ensuring the livelihood of rural communities. Besides providing food, they can be a precursor to poverty reduction and economic growth. Decentralization of natural resources management is estimated to generate considerable benefits which are analyzed in three aspects, the economic, social and ensuring their sustainable development. Even in our country, in the context of achieving high levels of democratic governance and transition to a consolidated market economy, have been undertaken several decentralization reforms in different areas. One of the most important, is the transfer of a part of natural resources such are communal forests and pastures, in owneship of local governments units, in order to fulfill better the community needs, increase benefits from their use and at the same time protect them. In this paper, in addition to the analysis of secondary data available, it is intended to assess community perceptions of the importance of these resources in the creation of family income as well as, the possibility to increase the income generated after their transfer to local governments. Assessment is based on primary data collected by surveying members of rural communities affected by the decentralization process of these natural resources