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New series of Webinars kicks off on Thursday 8 April – Registration still open
Thursday 8 April, 18:00-19:00 CEST
The first event in the new series of webinars is coming up on Thursday 8 April 2021 at 18:00 CEST on “New opportunities and challenges for local development in a post-Covid world”.
While it is too early to measure the full impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and the resulting restrictions, it seems clear that society and economies will be profoundly affected. Can local communities find sustainable solutions to loss of markets or incomes from tourism, increased precarity and sense of isolation of the most vulnerable groups, while capitalising on emerging opportunities such as increased demand for local food, remote working arrangements or urban-rural flight? Discussion around this question will be illustrated with short case studies from rural, urban and fisheries areas.
Moderators: Peter Ramsden, series coordinator, LDnet Vice President, Urszula Budzich-Tabor, webinar leader, LDnet President
Speakers:
Fausto González Egido & Lola Fernández Perpiñan, ADAC, La Asociación para el Desarrollo de La Alcarria y La Campiña en Guadalajara (The Association for the Development of La Alcarria and La Campiña in Guadalajara).
Fausto and Lola Will present step-by-step best practices from ADAC’s experience in responding to the impact of Covid. They range from launching a situation analysis including a survey of companies to learn about the Covid-19 situation, to detecting their needs and responding with practical actions. For instance, ADAC detected the need to invest in infrastructure for Covid and in other business projects and prepared a line of LEADER grants published; also, ADAC detected the need for workers to pick fresh vegetables (green asparagus) and 800 contacts of workers were obtained that allowed the asparagus harvest.
Giuseppe Pace, Researcher at the Institute for Studies on the Mediterranean in Naples, LDnet board member.
Naples: Life without tourism. How covid-19 opens new sustainable perspectives to tourism offer. Tourism is one of the main economic sectors affected by the current pandemic. The case of Naples, a metropolitan city characterised by a sustained growth in tourism demand drastically reduced in the last year, is emblematic. The past tourism offer adapted to the new situation in different ways, weakly supported by the public, and mainly unconcerned about digital transition. The presentation investigates how the local system reacted and, through recent data and interviews, tries to identify sustainable touristic policies for the 2021-2027 regional programming.
Monica Veronesi Burch, Team Leader at FARNET, the European network of fisheries areas implementing CLLD.
Monica will explore different forms of support from Fisheries Local Action Groups (FLAGs) following the COVID-19 pandemic, including promotion of the seafood sector to maintain the local market for fisheries products, facilitating the move to digital sales, new products such as hand sanitiser, and new partnerships (e.g. processors with restaurants; care givers with fishers…). She including specific examples such as direct sales from the Baltic Sea Coast FLAG (DE) and local support network to defend businesses and feed those in need – project Aqua-Solidaire, supported by Esterel Côte d’Azur FLAG (FR).
Discussion:
Nearly half of the session will be devoted to open discussion with the participants, including a response by Robert Lukesch, ÖAR GmbH, LDnet board member.
What can communities do to spur the recovery from Covid-19?
How can local action complement governmental and EU actions?
Is engaging local actors the way forward to a more sustainable future?
Following positive feedback from participants in LDnet’s 2020 series of webinars, we are launching a new series of four webinars in April 2021, in partnership with the RSA, ELARD and AEIDL, on “The Contribution of Community-based Initiatives to the Covid Recovery”‘ with a focus on community-based initiatives for sustainable development.
The webinars will be streamed via Zoom and will follow the same format as last year: through short late afternoon/early evening sessions relying on short/sharp presentations and lively contributions from participants and discussion, to look at how the lessons from local responses and the longer-term changes in the social and economic landscape are reshaping the CLLD-type approaches to local development and post-Covid recovery.
The full programme comprises 4 webinars, to be held on consecutive Thursdays at 18:00 CEST.
Registration is open. For more details and to register click here.
Action Chair: Giuseppe Pace
Action Vice Chair: Susana Martinez-Rodriguez
Science Communication Manager: Tony Cassar
Grant Holder Manager: Patricia Sclafani
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