Project Summary

Rural areas in Adriatic-Ionian regions face some common socioeconomic and environmental challenges, including depopulation, brain-drain & ageing population, limited connectivity & access to public infrastructures & services as well as lack of opportunities in policy co-creation & access to funding. These challenges are the most pressing for rural communities (citizens and their SMEs). Additionally, climate change, leading to more frequent extreme weather events, poses serious challenges to the resilience and economy of rural communities. The key to unlocking the full potential of rural areas and helping them become more resilient, is to empower these rural areas and increase the development of networks & clusters among partners, regions, and enterprises to form a multiregional innovation system. Through Interreg VI B IPA ADRION - Specific Objective 1.1 Strengthening innovation capacities in the Adriatic - Ionian region, ADRURAL project aims to empower rural communities by utilising existing tested & innovative Smart Solutions and other innovation Solutions scenarios & models, addressing key societal and environmental rural challenges. These challenges will be addressed via community-led innovations/Smart Solutions (developed by other projects or initiatives and covering a wide range of relevant challenges faced by rural communities across the EU), from - indicatively- the following six (5) domains:

• Circular Bioeconomy,
• Biodiversity & Ecosystem Management,
• Resilience to Shocks,
• Citizen Engagement & Quality of Life,
• Lifelong Education & Training and
• Climate Adaptation & Mitigation

The selected Smart Solutions & scenarios, from these domains, with collected data & information from and for the project, will be demonstrated transregionally, according to geographical & socioeconomical criteria, in five (5) Mini Rural Living Labs (MRLLs) pilots, located in selected countries of the partners in Adriatic - Ionian area. These pilots will vary in economic & socio-cultural contexts by paying specific attention to the needs of women, youth & vulnerable groups, and also will produce new data, upscale knowledge & successful scenarios with the tested Smart Solutions & innovation Solutions. This will lead to the development of successful Innovative Models for rural communities. Moreover, these efforts will result in the creation of a resource library, an online learning system, a discussion forum & a hub for gathering relative information, accessible to users via an integrated ADRURALs Online Rural Empowerment Hub (OREH), incorporating as well innovative solutions, data, models, policies, sources of knowledge, funding opportunities & good practices, from other projects & initiatives. The goal is to establish an accessible integrated live system of shared knowledge. ADRURAL will follow a multi-actor approach through joint rural stakeholder’s actions and governance schemes. A networking strategy will enable links with relevant organisations, networks, projects, initiatives to ensure the active engagement of rural communities and their SMEs for societal & economical change. A new approach & strategy incorporating innovative models and good practices, will be developed & tested through co-creation with users in partners' rural communities, aiming for more resilient & sustainable rural areas in the Adriatic-Ionian region. This approach will be implemented in a living network system which will support evidence-based governance frameworks, policy making and funding instruments to increase knowledge transfer between these specific countries, regions & citizens to address their needs and tackle their challenges effectively.