Related Research

NISRIE

NISRIE, "Novel Insights on Scotland's Island and Rural Communities" is a research project which aims to expand the knowledge base on rural and island economies. This project is funded as part of the Scottish Government’s 2022-2027 Strategic Research Programme on Environment, Natural Resources and Agriculture

The primary aim of the NISRIE project will focus our research on four key areas

• Rural Enterprises
• Community Wealth Building
• Agriculture Beyond-Brexit
• Rural Food Economies

ReRIC

ReRIC - "Reimagined Policy Futures: Shaping sustainable, inclusive and just rural and island communities in Scotland (ReRIC)", which will run from 2022 to 2027, is organised into seven work packages (or mini-projects) focussing on a number of topics.

Research will include reviewing the history and evolution of rural and island policy in Scotland since the 1960s to challenges which have been experienced by many rural and island communities for decades – affordable housing, demographic change and out-migration and social exclusion and marginalisation.

Rural Lens

Researchers at SRUC are working with colleagues at the James Hutton Institute, the University of Aberdeen and Newcastle University to set up a Strategic Advisory Group to support policy colleagues in the Scottish Government to undertake rural proofing.
Rural proofing is initially being undertaken with three projects funded through the National Strategy for Economic Transformation, focusing on public sector business support, skills provision and community wealth building.
The Specialist Advisory Group will work closely with policy officials in the Scottish Government’s Rural and Islands Futures Division to finalise the Rural Lens guidance, identify appropriate methods to evaluate the impacts of rural proofing activities including through developing a set of indicators, and provide advice on how rural and islands policy-makers can engage with colleagues across Scottish Government to support them in undertaking rural proofing.
This work is funded by SEFARI and the academic members of the Specialist Advisory Group are:

• Dr Mags Currie (James Hutton Institute)
• Professor Sally Shortall and Professor Mark Shucksmith (Newcastle University)
• Professor Lorna Philip (University of Aberdeen)
• Dr Jane Atterton and Dr Ana Vuin (Rural Policy Centre, SRUC)

For more information on this project, please contact: jane.atterton@sruc.ac.uk