Rural Alliances launched to help rural vibrancy

Professor Terry Marsden has been appointed to the Policy and Advisory Panel of an exciting new €10million initiative which will benefit rural communities and promote best practice between different EU regions.

The Rural Alliances project has been launched at a conference in Cardiff and will form new alliances to generate business opportunities, safeguard rural services and make their local areas special places for people to visit, live and raise their families. Terry addressed the conference asking questions around how can rural communities evolve in a genuinely sustainable way. He also asked the audience to think about why some places are hotbeds of innovation and others are not.  And also what can we do to help innovative rural projects be scaled up and scaled out to the main stream?

Terry said: "I'm delighted to have been asked to be on the Policy and Advisory Panel for Rural Alliances.  The project will bring new insights into developing and changing rural areas partnership approach to generating new business, employment and tourism, as well as protecting special landscapes."

The Brecon Beacons National Park Authority and its eleven partners spread across Europe will lead the three-year collaborative Rural Alliances project to support rural enterprises and communities.  The Policy and Advisory Panel is a key element of the project and will draw on the experience and knowledge of practitioners, researchers and policy makers.

As leaders of the Rural Alliances project, Brecon Beacons National Park Authority will focus its efforts on enabling tourism clusters to make links with their local communities in order to better manage and develop opportunities, including green tourism and the impact of demographic change in their communities.  The Brecon Beacons will benefit from €0.5million (£400,000) allocated to Wales through the project under the EU's Interreg IVB North West Europe programme.  On top of this, the Welsh Government will invest over €400,000 (£320,000) through its Targeted Match Fund.