Written answers
Thursday, 2 May 2013
Department of Environment, Community and Local Government
Commission for the Economic Development of Rural Areas
Pat Deering (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fine Gael)
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147. To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government if he will provide a progress report on the work of the Commission for the Economic Development of Rural Areas; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [20905/13]
Phil Hogan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fine Gael)
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Minister Coveney and I established the Commission for the Economic Development of Rural Areas (CEDRA) in September 2012 and since then the Commission has been working towards the publication of a report that will inform policies and strategies to support the economic development of rural Ireland into the future. The Commission and its Chair , Mr Pat Spillane , have been engaging with stakeholder groups and the general public over the last number of months regarding ideas to support the future economic development of rural areas and I am grateful for their work to date.
The central element of the work of CEDRA is an extensive public consultation process which has been on-going since February 2013 . To date the Commission has held 18 stakeholder meetings which looked at broader areas of rural life, 2 focus group meetings looking at rural tourism and social enterprise, 2 sub-group meetings looking at export and rural resources and 8 general public meetings all over Ireland. In total 360 people have attended the public meetings with a further 225 people attending the stakeholder meetings.
The Commission is also conducting a parallel research process and ha s requested submissions on its website including an option to complete an online questionnaire. To date 60 questionnaires have been completed. In addition to this , 108 submissions have been received. In total between the consultation and research exercises 850 contributions have been received to date for consideration in the CEDRA research process. T he Commission will present its preliminary findings at a conference on 10 June 2013 in NUI Maynooth with the final report due in October 2013.
I believe there is clear evidence that rural communities all over Ireland have embraced the CEDRA research process ; I am confident that the information that emerges from this process will provide an invaluable insight into the economic development of rural areas and assist policy making into the future.
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