In many communities in rural areas of Europe, services of general interest are threatened or have already been lost - with serious negative effects on the quality of life of the people living there. They feel disconnected and in many places a disenchantment with politics or even democracy is developing. Neither the market nor politics have been able to stop the collapse of structures. New approaches are therefore needed to ensure the sustainable provision of services of general interest, which are (co-)initiated by citizens and implemented together with all local actors. The project is dedicated to this challenge. Within democratically structured participation processes in 7 pilot communities, citizens are enabled and supported in initiating and if necessary, running multifunctional centres of sustainable services of general interest – NahDa-Centres. A NahDa-Centre offers not only food and goods for daily use, but also other services that are currently lacking and needed in the villages - such as medical and social care, gastronomy, post office, bank, mobility, meeting rooms, barrier-free living space, cultural offers... In order to support citizens in the conception of needs-oriented and economically viable NahDa-centres, two software tools with application guidelines will be developed: A basic-analysis-tool for the calculation of profitability and a tool for activating household surveys - for the holistic and demand-oriented development of offers in the NahDa centres. The tools and application guidelines will be available to the NahDa-Teams and other initiatives and developed with few barriers and high usability to give access to users with different levels of prior knowledge. In an online database, researched best-practice projects for sustainable services of general interest from several European countries are prepared and compiled, so that the NahDa-Teams do not have to reinvent the wheel, but can learn from the best. The database is also available to other interested communities or local initiatives and can inspire and motivate them to initiate NaDa-processes and new NahDa-Centres. The committed citizens - the NahDa-Teams - are empowered by professional Trainers, the NahDa-Process coordinators, who are also specifically trained for their work: Certified curricula are developed for the training of the NahDa-Teams as well as for the training of the process coordinators. Within the framework of the project, 20 employees of the partner organisations will be trained as adult trainers and process coordinators in the field of sustainable services of general interest and approx. 56 citizens in 7 model communities will be qualified to develop and operate perfectly fitting NahDa-Centres for their communities as local NahDa-Teams. Residents and community leaders of the pilot communities who are not actively involved in the NahDa teams are reached through awareness-raising activities and public events and sensitized for sustainability issues. In the pilot communities, NahDa-Centres are established as a visible sign of sustainable consumption and lifestyle. In this way, citizens experience the possibilities of shaping their own lives in a democratic culture with a high degree of self-efficacy. In addition, local jobs are created, regional economic cycles are strengthened and in the long term the quality of life is increased for all. The ECTS-certified training courses for process coordinators are offered by the partner organisations on an ongoing basis after the end of the project and are available to other adult education institutions. After the end of the project, the partner organisations will carry out the NahDa-ideal process in other interested communities and qualify further NahDa-Teams within the framework of this process. The ideal processes and the project results from the pilot communities will be compiled in a handbook for Europe-wide transferability. The project results will be presented to relevant stakeholders and the associated partners from politics, church, economy, civil society, science and research in three international multiplier events. In addition, the multiplier events offer the participants opportunities for exchange on topics of sustainable services of general interest, for getting to know already existing best practice projects, as well as for international networking. The project partners of the consortium have the common intention to initiate a European network of rural academies for sustainable services of general interest (LAND). In LAND-Academies, as future competence centres for innovative, sustainable solutions for challenges in rural areas, further qualifications for process facilitators and citizens will be offered.
The project aimed to develop a transferable approach to safeguarding services of general interest in rural communities. For this purpose, employees of the partner organisations were to be trained as process facilitators in the field of sustainable provision of public services, and citizens in model communities were to be qualified as actors in sustainable provision of public services in order to develop NahDa centres for their community as local NahDa teams. The backgrounds and contexts of sustainable services of general interest should be prepared for the awareness raising of a heterogeneous target group. Since the lack of services of general interest in rural regions is a challenge that most European countries are facing, the intention was to research and prepare European best practice models in transnational cooperation. In this way, the most innovative developments from all partner countries were to be incorporated into the project. Taking into account different country specifics, the solution approach was to be developed transnationally in order to take into account and ensure the requirement of international transferability of the model already during the development.
The project was dedicated to the lack of services of general interest in rural regions of Europe. In numerous communities in rural regions of Europe, services of general interest are threatened or have already broken down - with serious negative effects on the quality of life of the people living there. They feel disconnected and in many places there is a disenchantment with politics or even democracy. Neither the market nor politics alone have been able to stop the collapse of structures. Therefore, new solutions are needed to sustainably secure the provision of public services, which are initiated by committed people on the ground and implemented together with the local actors. This challenge should be met with the qualification of adults and innovative approaches to solutions. Based on a lack of supply offers, it was intended that as many of the 9 basic functions of existence as possible would be secured in a local NahDa centre (NahDa = sustainable provision of services of general interest) in the future. The consortium consisted of actors from the field of adult education in the context of neighbourhood and regional development and intended to develop new educational offers for the described challenge in the project.