On the 16th of March, a workshop was held in the context of PoliRural Macedonian pilot Gevgelija-Strumica. The workshop was held online and it included the discussion of recent results of the pilot. The meeting also included a presentation of the policy evaluation results, as well as the next steps in Foresight exercise.
More info about the pilot can be found here.
PoliRural participated in virtual event Rural Vision Week – Imagining the future of Europe’s rural areas, an event promoted by the European Network for Rural Development (ENRD), in close cooperation with the European Commission, that happened between 22 and 26 March 2021.
This interactive event included high level presentations and discussions, a marketplace, workshops and ‘fringe’ activities. These involved European stakeholder participants in working together to contribute to the preparation of a long-term Vision for the future of EU rural areas in relation to which the Commission is scheduled to adopt a Communication later this summer.
PoliRural contributed to the event with a virtual stall, that included promotional info about the project, relevant documents and more. You can visit PoliRural stall here.
More info about the event Rural Vision Week – Imagining the future of Europe’s rural areas is available here.
On the 19th of February, 2021, the Ypaithros newspaper had a press coverage of the PoliRural project. The article describes the evaluation’s results of Measure 4.1 of the local Leader program 2007-2013 implementation, which was carried out through the use of appropriate questionnaires and telephone interviews.
It also describes the results in terms of investigating the social, technological, economic, environmental, political and other factors that affect the development of rural areas, which were extracted through webinars, organized from the Greek pilot of the project, with local bodies of the region of Central Greece.
The article is available in Greek here.
On 9 February took place 4. online workshop organized jointly by the Slovak POLIRURAL project team in which participated 25 stakeholders. It was dedicated to the gradual and participative foresight exercise leading to the preparation of „Vision for more attractive rural areas in Slovakia “. Experts from different fields and people from the ground dived deeper into three clusters of connected drivers that will affect the change in the Slovak countryside in the next 20 years.
The first two clusters dedicated to “Sustainable and resilient food system” and “Diversification of rural economy” were presented in the form of deep dives papers available also online for further comments and inputs. The third cluster focused on “Civil engagement” was discussed in the interactive form to gain input for the deep dive paper.
Education and training were highlighted as an area that requires additional attention. Response to the impacts of the current pandemic on rural areas will be discussed in the next workshop that will take place next week on 18 February. Participants were invited to be active in preparation of the next workshop and to provide ideas on how and around what topics to structure the discussion.
In times when people are not allowed to meet in person the Slovak project team has developed a special feature on national POLIRUAL website (https://atraktivnyvidiek.sk), where people can provide their inputs and comments and broader spectrum of views can be incorporated into the vision development. Inclusivity and participation are the key driving forces of the process and can guaranteed the outcome that is more effective, efficient and better centred around people and their future. Thematic groups were created in the online forum to allow structured discussion.
The representative of the European Network for Rural Development delivered presentation on the current status of preparation of the EU long-term Vision for Rural Areas until 2040, where participatory process and cross sectoral cooperation of different Commission services were highlighted. Slovakia was an active player in the public consultation which was appreciated.
The COVID-19 INSPIRE Hackathon was already the 17th hackathon organised by the Plan4All association in cooperation with the Czech Centre for Science and Society (CCSS) and other H2020 projects including SmartAgriHubs. It was based on the traditional model of the INSPIRE Hackathon, which is not a single event, it’s a process that is designed to efficiently exploit the achieved results of previous hackathons on developing new innovations. Due to the limitations caused by the COVID-19 situation, this event was triggered as a virtual hackathon.
The main goal of the COVID19 INSPIRE Hackathon was to support innovation in agriculture through information technology, help agriculture recover from the problems that were caused by the coronavirus crisis as well as search for new business models. Overall, thirteen innovation experiments were identified for the COVID19 INSPIRE Hackathon 2020.
The COVID-19 INSPIRE Hackathon was divided into 5 main stages:
In the period October 15 – November 30 2020 two main stages of the COVID-19 INSPIRE Hackathon took place – the hacking stage and final stage. During the hacking stage, teams work together to bring new solutions regarding 13 Innovation Experiments defined in the preparation stage of the hackathon. More specifically, the team work is to collect technology and data, explore & ideate & co-create the IEs and develop & test the IE solutions. Another important part of the hacking stage is the capacity building actions and dissemination & communication. The capacity building was developed virtually through the webinars & online training (September 25 – October 26) and communication channels that were established for each IE – e.g. Skype, WhatsApp, Google docs. Another important part of the capacity building was mentoring, counselling, coaching and technical assistance executed by 20 IE mentors. Leveraging local knowledge or experience was, besides webinars and mentoring, done via ongoing H2020 projects, initiatives, DIHs: Plan4all hub, PoliRural hub, SIEUSOIL hub, Agrihub and SmartAfriHub.
The COVID-19 INSPIRE Hackathon was terminated by a final presentation of results & awards ceremony held on 19th November 2020. The final virtual event together with the collection of the final reports fall into the final hackathon stage that aims at presentation and promotion of the results of IEs and selection of top 3 solutions by the jury members based on evaluation criteria that were defined in the preparation stage. The jury members: Jovana Vlaskalin (BioSense Institute), Beata Vörösová (CzechInvest), Maris Albers (University of Latvia) and Josef Hnojil (Geobusiness) announced the following winners for the COVID-19 INSPIRE hackathon:
On 24th of November 2020, the leader of the Greek Pilot Mrs Nicoleta Darra, attended the on-line event entitled “The European Researchers ‘Night” which was organised by the University of Foggia. Being a young researcher, Mrs Darra was invited to participate in discussion concerning PoliRural project implementation in Greece. Her presentation, “PoliRural – Policy Development for rural areas”, focused on the main objectives of the project and how to promote rural development and enhance attractiveness of rural areas for established populations and recent or potential newcomers.
The event promoted by the European Commission within the Framework Program for Research and Innovation “HORIZON 2020”, called “European Researchers’ Night Apulia2”, aimed at spreading the scientific culture and the role of Research.
In Ireland, emigration has long been an historical fact of life. However, immigration particularly in the 1800’s and 1900’s, was practically invisible and had little impact on population statistics.
In 1994 this situation changed. The number of immigrants exceeded the number of emigrants in a trend that has continued unabated ever since. The arrival of these new immigrants has had a dramatic effect on Ireland’s population diversity and it is most noticeable in its rural towns and villages, particularly in counties with small populations like County Monaghan (61,386 people, census 2016).
In County Monaghan, where the Irish PoliRural pilot is taking place, the migrant population almost doubled between 2005 and 2011, growing from 6% to 11% in the time. The migrants who live here are an eclectic mixture of migrant workers (mainly from Eastern Europe and South America), UNHCR refugees (from the Congo and from Syria), asylum seekers (from all across the world) and others who have chosen Ireland as their home for a variety reasons (e.g. some have married into the country, others have returned to the land of their ancestors, etc). The reality for many rural counties is that without migration, many of our areas may see population decreases over time, often resulting in a prolonged spiral of decline for the area.
The migrant population have brought new skills and talents that they have used to create employment and generate wealth. They have lowered the average age of the population and their children have ensured that many of our rural schools have been able to retain teachers. They have enriched the cultural life of our communities.
Not everyone appreciates this fact and the rapid change in our society has the potential to stoke fear and resentment. That is why good integration policies are needed to give people a sense of belonging in their community. With this in mind, Monaghan Integrated Development led a collaboration with local government, local agencies and migrant representative groups to access LEADER funding for a migrant integration strategy, that now complements and feeds into the region’s PoliRural Foresight plans.
The strategy was launched online in November 2020 and charts a course for belonging and integration actions in Co Monaghan for the next 5 years. It contains 6 Objectives and 38 actions. Each action has a lead agency who will oversee its implementation in the years ahead.
Speaking at the launch, Lalini Veerassamy, Chief of the International Organization of Migration mission in Ireland, emphasised ‘the importance of integration as a two-way process as mutual adaptation between migrants and host societies from all levels, the social, cultural, political but also economic point of view.’ These sentiments were echoed throughout by various speakers including Sunday Abel Adoyeji, representing New Communities on the Monaghan Integrated Development CLG Board, Chairperson of LINC, a social enterprise and Cultural Champion. He mentioned his own positive experience of being a migrant in County Monaghan and said ‘successful integration of migrants is, in fact, about successful interactions. It’s about communities that offer a generous welcome. It’s about the willingness and, sometimes, bravery, to accept that welcome’.
The strategy can be downloaded here.