"This paper has highlighted that the mass media can play an important, if not critical, role in both enhancing the flow of information and improving public-private dialogue in the local context. The paper therefore recommends explicitly incorporating media into the approaches of LRED. This means working to build government and private sector capacity to interact with the mass media and to build the media itself to be an effective institution that can be a catalyst to positive local economic development. Applying both media development and development communication to private sector development, and particularly LRED, is a relatively new area of endeavour. As such, those who tackle this will need to be innovative and adapt existing tools or develop new tools and approaches to working with mass media in the LRED context. The potential benefit of taking this innovative approach will be in making LRED better understood, more participative and more relevant by involving mass media that is the channel for information to and from mass audiences and a potential platform for public debate." (Summary and conclusion, page 17-18)