Country Focus
Navigating Towards Sustainable Forest Futures: Reflections from the 26th IUFRO World Congress
From the 23rd to 29th of June 2024, Stockholm hosted the prestigious 26th IUFRO World Congress under the theme “Forests and Society Towards 2050.” MARGISTAR’s Dr Oksana Pelyukh, an assistant at the Department of Ecological Economics and Business at the Ukrainian National Forestry University (Ukraine), attended this global gathering supported by the ITC Conference Grant provided by MARGISTAR. This blog reflects on her experience and insights gained during this transformative event.
The SIMRA Project: Enhancing Social Innovation in Marginalised (Mountainous) Rural Areas
The Social Innovation in Marginalised Rural Areas (SIMRA) project, funded by the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme, operated from 2016 to 2020. Its main objective was to deepen our understanding of social innovation and innovative governance within agriculture, forestry, and rural development sectors, with a particular focus on Europe's marginalised rural areas as these often lack evidence of successful outcomes and necessary supporting conditions. Read on for an overview of the project, its achievements, and how MARGISTAR will use its findings to uncover further transformation pathways for European marginalised mountain regions.
Helping rural Ireland reimagine a more prosperous future for their towns and villages
By Dr Michelle Cowley-Cunningham and Antonia Egli (Dublin City University) Rural development creates vibrant environments with improved economic opportunities for people to live and work....
Living Labs: Facilitators in Fostering Innovation in Marginalised Mountain Areas
By Klaus Wagner, Ingrid Machold, and Somaye Latifi (Federal Institute of Agricultural Economics, Rural and Mountain Research (BAB), Vienna) The number of challenges that mountains...
Mountaineering Villages: An Initiative of the Austrian Alpine Association for Sustainable Mountain Tourism
Mountain areas attract outstanding numbers of tourists. After beaches and islands, they act as the second most demanded outdoor destination for tourism activities. Where agriculture has long been the main source of income and entire areas are characterised by outmigration, tourism has sustainably improved and transformed the working and living conditions of local populations. Based on work being done in Austria, this blog shares insights into how promoting tourism activities in so-called Mountaineering Villages as a means of income diversification beyond traditional sectors can pose as an effective solution in marginalised mountain areas.
Céad Míle Fáilte: MARGISTAR Meets in Ireland for the COST Action’s Second General Assembly
On April 17 and 18, the Irish Institute of Digital Business (IIDB) at Dublin City University (DCU) welcomed international researchers from the MARGISTAR COST Action to the project's second annual General Assembly in Dublin. Prof Theo Lynn, Prof Colm O'Gorman, and Antonia Egli represent Ireland within the MARGISTAR consortium and lead the Action's Science Communications team. Over two days, consortium members focused on strategies to further progress MARGISTAR during the second grant period and met with stakeholders in Ireland to understand how different communities were seeking to address issues through rural town regeneration, digitisation, re-afforestation, or diversifying agriculture.
