Ms Deirdre de Bhail?s:

Gabhaim buíochas leis an gCathaoirleach as an gcuireadh a bheith páirteach sa chomhrá seo inniu. Is mise Deirdre de Bhailís, bainisteoir ginearálta Dingle Hub. I thank the committee for the opportunity to participate in this discussion.

I will start by giving a little background on Corca Dhuibhne, the Dingle Peninsula. Members are most likely all aware that it is a popular tourist destination. It has a population of almost 13,000, but we see visitors in excess of 1 million annually. Tourism accounts for 30% of the local economy, but much of our tourism product is low value. Farm to fork is undeveloped, and much of our agriculture product is not retained locally.

One of our starting points was to undertake an energy master plan for the peninsula, and this guided a lot of the work that we have been doing for the past number of years. It tells us that 54% of our energy use relates to transport and that 49% of our emissions relate to agriculture. From 2018, based on the quadruple helix model involving science, policy, industry and society, the Dingle Hub set about developing relationships and building collaborations in the areas of sustainability, the digital transformation and the creative industries. These three pillars were chosen to both build on inherent strengths and prior initiatives, and also because they are the key areas for the future.

What has emerged is an EU living laboratory, a place where we have built the ecosystem to enable test and trial projects, and a place where innovation can flourish. These projects engage the local community, schools, and the business, transport, tourism and farming sectors to explore and enable the broader societal changes required for the low-carbon transition, while also identifying employment opportunities to help create the conditions for a sustainable economic future for the area.

There are 18 projects in progress, with several already completed, and these include: electric vehicles; solar photovoltaic, PV, battery trials; the introduction of new Transport for Ireland Local Link bus services; a study of the feasibility of anaerobic digestion, which is a key circular economy enabler for the region; and the establishment of both farming and tourism and hospitality sustainable energy communities. There are a further five projects in the pipeline.

We are already seeing the establishment of new companies as a direct impact of involvement in the various projects that are under way. As these companies emerge, we leverage entrepreneurial and scaling services for them through working with the relevant agencies and networks. We are seeing that these companies are benefiting from access to knowledgeable, engaged groups to pilot their early-stage platforms. To date, the economic impact of the Dingle Hub is measured at 192 full-time equivalent incomes supported on the peninsula.

This work underpins the concept of scaling deep, as opposed to scaling up. This concept is defined by the Dingle Hub as a process of regional development by fusing enterprise, infrastructure and community development. With significant support from Science Foundation Ireland, SFI, in recent years, we have been able to work with academic partners MaREI, which is the SFI research centre for energy, climate and marine, to track, analyse and share experiential learnings with a view to informing policy and practice through our engaged research outputs.

Engaged research has been critical to our journey, because without it, how could we understand the dynamics of what is happening on the ground, and how to replicate the most impactful solutions? One of the submissions that resonated with me through the Creating our Future report was one which proposed that communities have a local scientist working in the local community centre, as part of a national network of community science to help address local problems. This is, in effect, what we have been doing in recent years. Enabling this at scale requires that funding bodies offer core funding to both the academic institution and also to the community groups to cover staff costs.

Our outcomes to date span everything from network building, capacity building and project delivery, to new business development and income creation. We have built a strong and vibrant network of over 500 connected, flexible workers, business owners, young people, farmers and members of the creative community who support each other and identify and pursue mutually-beneficial opportunities.

Táimid lonnaithe i gceantar Gaeltachta agus tá an Ghaelainn lárnach inár n-obair ar fad. Mar atá luaite i gceann de na treoracha chun gnímh, feicim an Ghaeilge á cur chun cinn mar theanga bheo go laethúil inár dtionscadail éagsúla agus le cliaint an mhoil freisin. Feicim suim mhór ag daoine an teanga a fhoghlaim agus a úsáid. Tá sé sin an-dóchasach do thodhchaí na teanga.

We continue to build on this strong foundation to layer integrated, ongoing initiatives, that will deliver long-term impact for our community. We have learned from this work that sub-county structures must be those that support communities and organisations at a very local level, to help provide this level of agency and empowerment to communities.