The CIER Congress is a heritage of the “Spanish-Portuguese Colloquium of Rural Studies”, later called “Iberian Colloquium of Rural Studies” (CIER), organized by the Spanish Association of Agrifood Economics (AEEA) and the Portuguese Society of Rural Studies (SPER) with the intention to create a space for meeting and debate among specialists in the rural environment. The first edition was held in 1988 in Évora, Portugal, and since then it has been held alternately in one city in each country.

In the eighth edition (Cáceres, 2010), the Rural Sociology group of the Spanish Federation of Sociology (FES) joined the organization. In the tenth edition (Palencia, 2014), the Food Sociology Group of the FES, the Association of Spanish Geographers (AGE) and the Spanish Society of Agrarian History (SEHA) also joined. All these incorporations strengthened the multidisciplinary nature of the CIERs in the field of social sciences related to the rural sector.

In the eleventh edition (Vila Real, 2016) as a result of the growing participation of researchers and rural development actors from the other side of the Atlantic, it was decided to take a new leap, incorporating the numerous associations and experts from the countries of both regions, and moving to the current name of Ibero-American Congress of Rural Studies, which maintains the acronym and the historical series of editions. The first Congress under this new scope was held in 2018 in Cuenca (XII CIER).

Under the academic umbrella of ALASRU (Latin America) scientific associations from Portugal (SPER), Brazil (SOBER), Spain (AEEA and Sociology-FES, SEHA), Mexico (AMER) are participating in this XIII edition.

The XIII CIER Congress, initially planned to be held in 2020, will be held from 10 to 12 November 2021, in the city of Valdivia, Chile. The theme of this next edition is “The construction of today’s rurality: territories for life”, which seeks to encompass the diversity of interests and theoretical, methodological and empirical approaches to understanding the multiple territories, populations and local dynamics in the contemporary globalized world that will make it possible to identify tools to face the challenges imposed by agriculture, agribusiness, food chains and rural development.

The themes will address rural labor markets, public policies, territorial development and well-being, innovation and technological change, without forgetting rural population, inclusion and inequality, identities and social representations. All this in a context of broad social and territorial imbalances, a situation that leads rural populations to establish adaptation strategies in times of accelerated transformations.