Smart Villages

This webinar has ended. You can watch the recording, access the presentations and discover the key learnings in this follow-up article.

On 28 June from 14:00 to 15:30 CEST, the Policy Learning Platform is hosting a webinar on the topic of Smart Villages. Register today!

Smart Villages are communities in rural areas that use innovative solutions to improve their resilience, building on local strengths and opportunities. They rely on a participatory approach to develop and implement their strategy to improve their economic, social and/or environmental conditions, in particular by mobilising solutions offered by digital technologies.

Smart Villages benefit from cooperation and alliances with other communities and actors in rural and urban areas. The initiation and implementation of Smart Village strategies may build on existing initiatives and can be funded by a variety of public and private sources (ENRD).

The EU Rural Review on Smart Villages shows that these initiatives are often driven by growing concern for the major challenges affecting rural areas such as depopulation and access to services.

At the same time, there is increasing recognition of the need to enable rural communities to make the most of new opportunities offered by a digital transformation, the transition to a low-carbon and circular economy, new forms of urban-rural linkages, emerging value chains and others.

What you can expect

The latest insights on Smart villages will be provided by: 

• Maria-Christina Makrandreou from DG Regio, European Commission.
• Enrique Nieto from ENRD and head of Policy Unit at the European Association.

Good practices presentations: 

• Clive Peckham will present the good practice Lormes Smart Village
• Jan Malmgren and Tim Malmgren will give insight to Smart Villages Strategies