The framework of the essay is the re-emerging of the rural topic and the role of peasant farming to generate local innovation. The crisis of the agricultural modernization matchs with the re-emergence of the peasant model of production and the multifucntionality in agriculture: the multifunctionality can have a positive impact in order to generate external economies, local public goods, territorial innovation and organizational learning. Moreover, the local specificities (as cultivars and food, knowledge, countryside) become very meaningful to create natural comparative advantages for local territory to resist and compete in the global economy. In conclusion, the emergence of the new peasantries in the rural areas involves an interesting change of perspective, such as that one we had in the recent past into the studies about the industrial districts.