Diagnosis and Development of innovation potential in rural areas through innovative network

1. Leo-Women - Business creation and regeneration processes focused on the role of women as change and learning facilitators Diagnosis and Development of innovation potential in rural areas through innovative network strategies. By Lilia Infelise - ARTES president 29th September 2000, BrusselsThuringian Information Office

2. Leo-Women - Business creation and regeneration processes focused on the role of women as change and learning facilitators • A multinational team co-ordinated by ARTES has explored world wide models aimed at • enhancing the role of women as key initiators and facilitators of regeneration programmes entailing business creation of competitive business networks

3. Conceptual framework for the identification and development of competence for entrepreneurial and economic development in European rural areas - Leonardo da Vinci Alliance- An alliance for the development of enterprise creation and employment in rural areas of Europe - Employment NOW programme Leo-Women - Business creation and regeneration processes focused on the role of women as change and learning facilitators - Integration of two Programmes

4. The Partnership ARTES - Applied Research into Training and Education Systems (main contractor and co-ordinator) - Italy Academia Romana (RO) Bildungswerk der Thüringer Wirtschaft (D) Contact International Limited (IR) InterLearn Limited (UK) Romanian Business School “Alba Iulia” (RO)

5. Regeneration of rural culture Alliance between local and international resources Innovative models of training - research - action Creation of competitive businesses on international markets Role of the woman as a facilitator of change and the creation of local and international networks for change Leo-Women - Business creation and regeneration processes focused on the role of women as change and learning facilitators - Key themes

6. Leo-Women - Business creation and regeneration processes focused on the role of women as change and learning facilitators - Key themes • Business creation and sustainable regional development • Rural tourism and craft-related activities • Bridging isolated local areas with international markets

7. Leo - Women -Business creation and regeneration processes focused on the role of women as change and learning facilitators - Key Themes • Women committed to the pedagogy of change to build and re-build relationships for development • Integration of learning and change strategies and instruments • Integration of diagnosis and development phases

8. Leo-Women - Business creation and regeneration processes focused on the role of women as change and learning facilitators - The aim • Learning from a critical appraisal of theoretical works and innovative experiences • Moving from the traditional needs analysis of individuals and organisations to the diagnosis/development of local community potential through innovative network strategies

9. Leo-Women - Business creation and regeneration processes focused on the role of women as change and learning facilitators - Key activities World-wide overview of practices and conceptual frameworks which move from the traditional boundaries to the new frontiers of multidisciplinary approaches to regional sustainable development fully recognising the influence of local culture on the gender differences

10. Leo-Women - Business creation and regeneration processes focused on the role of women as change and learning facilitators -Key activities Two pilot projects (Italy and Romania)  Development of a general model of reference  Development of a monitoring and evaluation model

11. Leo-Women - Business creation and regeneration processes focused on the role of women as change and learning facilitators - Weaknesses of traditional approaches • focus on advanced industrialised contexts • focus on business or network of businesses • ex-post reading and description of successful experiences • scarce in-field analyses and trials on less developed areas • lack of consideration given to gender- specific contributions and to the influences of gender-discriminatory approaches.

12. Leo-Women - Business creation and regeneration processes focused on the role of women as change and learning facilitators - Integration with the Now project • The project aim has been to start and support business development fully embodied in the local community and aware of requisites for competition in an advanced international market

13. The Pilot Phasekey principles True innovation entails learning and true learning entails innovation True learning entails creative forgetting of habits which create obstacles to innovation Without any form of institutionalisation of the innovation, the regeneration processes are not sustainable over time

14. The Pilot Phasekey principles The local area potential has to be dealt with as if it were a living human being with a specific story, original attributes, learning style, commitment to learn and change

15. The Pilot Phasekey beneficiaries/actors 49 Women graduates (45) 109 Women of varying ages (60) 100 Institutional Development Activators (76)

16. The Pilot Phasekey principles The resources have to be explored in their potential for becoming levers for a modern, sustainable, long-lasting development confronted with advanced markets of goods and services.

17. The Pilot Phasekey principles The diagnosis approach has been centred on empowering, accompanying local actors (our formal beneficiaries) in recognising all the available resources and their potentiality to upgrade the local area’s economic wealth.

18. Stock of Capital Resources productive specialisation and capacity energy and other natural resources cultural wealth communication resources labour research and development facilities cultural educational and training facilities administrative centres The Pilot PhaseThe diagnosis

19. key networks(principles, paradigms, dynamics, expected trends, cultural background, style of interaction, learning, negotiation of interests...) Internal - external interactions(emigration, immigration, turn over of skilled people, any form of co-operation linkage with contexts external to the region of collective relevance, consensus, conflicts, diversity dealing experiences) The Pilot PhaseThe diagnosis

20. Activities and Time scale Aug. 1998 Jan.1998 • Task force training • Awareness- raising Feb. 2000 • Business development Sept. 1997 • Research and development NEGOTIATION FOR SUSTAINABILITY 20

21. The Pilot PhaseThe results • Creation of a Task Force gathered together under the “Alliance 2000” partnership • Identification and follow-through to the entrepreneurship and management development of three territorial projects (law 268/99- routes of wine and typical products) • Creation of 4 “business clusters” and the start up of 42 new businesses • Identification and setting up of a “Charter for Environmental Quality” in rural tourist districts.

22. The Pilot PhaseThe results • “La Strada del Vino, dei Saperi e dei Sapori” Oenogastronomic route in the Alto Marchesato Crotonese • “La Strada dei Prodotti Tipici del Mediterraneo” Route through the streams and torrents of the Locride Parco d’Aspromonte • “La Strada dei Boschi e del Vino” The Comunità Montana of the Tiriolo - Reventino - Mancuso mountains

23. The Pilot PhaseThe intervention • Identification and selection of male and female entrepreneurs or aspiring entrepreneurs in the agritourist, crafts and services sectors • Training and follow through of territorial and business development plans

24. The Pilot PhaseThe intervention- recruitment • Family groupings • Groups of friends • Individuals who manage or would like to manage an activity in the broad fields of tourism, agriculture and related productive sectors

25. The Pilot PhaseThe intervention - Typical candidatures • Home-owners who intend to convert them into small rural hotels or B&B • groups of agricultural experts, agronomists and other agriculture specialists interested in creating parks and garden centres and helping to protect the environment • co-operatives of supply and transport, transportation by jeep, mountain bike hire, sailing boat hire, tourist route assistance... • ...

26. The Pilot Phasethe intervention Four conditions are the cornerstones of the recruitment campaign: • You don’t feel like waiting any more for other people to plan out your future • You want to be, with a group of friends or with your family, the one to develop a business initiative that will give you economic satisfaction and the pleasure of working and getting out of the usual routine • You are ready to bet that "not everything goes the way it always has done!" • You believe that strength comes from standing united and this can transform the history, the culture and the human and natural resources of Calabria, into a product that can win on the international markets.

27. The Pilot PhaseThe intervention - the results of the recruitment campaign 82 women answered, all determined to set up a business with their own family or network of friends, more than 300 people altogether. All the 82 business ideas were accompanied, in the space of one month, along a pathway for choice orientation that in huge spacious halls made the would-be entrepreneurs re-live their history, analyse events and important encounters, reflect on their own resources and develop their own vision of their professional and personal futures. The method honed for the first time in this project created, in the space of a month, a solid team of 42 would-be women entrepreneurs having behind them a nucleus of family or friends, all determined to work together as a team to start up a business.

28. The Pilot PhaseThe intervention - the results of the recruitment campaign • Reception and • restaurant/catering industry; • Services; • Food production; • Textiles and furnishing.

29. The Pilot PhaseThe intervention - development model • Analysis of the entrepreneurship idea or business problems • Planning of the business action plan • Negotiation and signing of the action plan • Follow-through of the project up to the business plan development, prototype achievement and market comparison

30. The Pilot PhaseThe intervention - development model • Business plan • Organisation and management of the team • Management control and pricing policy • Marketing • Communication/management of external relationships • Internet in the business

31. Meeting with the administrators of the pilot territories Sharing of the development projects Identification of the administrators’ areas of direct responsibility Sharing of the environmental indicators to be monitored Drafting of the Environmental Quality Charter Beginning of the process (the local Agenda 21) The Pilot PhaseThe intervention - development model

32. The Pilot PhaseThe intervention - development model MENTORING ACTION LEARNING SET FORUM WORKSHOPS COMBINATION @ EXPLICIT EXTERNALISATION INTERNALISATION INTERNET IMPLICIT SOCIALIZATION

33. The Pilot Phase • RECRUITMENT • DECISION-MAKING ORIENTATION • ACCOMPANY BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT • INSTITUTIONALISE SUSTAINABILITY

34. The Pilot Phase - lessons learnt The vital ingredients Vision,conceptual and operational model, symbols,communication, time, energy, facilitators

35. The Pilot Phase - lessons learnt • Facilitators • Ownership of the process in the local community - Shared visions • Proximity of counselling and training • Methods to accompany business over time (not only start up) • Not stop-and-go incentives • Integrated local development methods • Continuity (medium term strategy) • Laws, programmes, procedures consistent with visions

36. The Pilot Phase - lessons learnt - women entrepreneurship in fragile areas Starting in fragile areas and from a fragile entrepreneurial subject: • a local development programme is a key requisite for the success of any business start up action • generic invitations to start a business / animation programmes fail without a preparatory long lasting programme of economic regeneration focused on what already exists • Women build business in networks • Marginality should be transformed into typical identity • Women should be given the autonomous capacity to evaluate whether the enterprise is what she actually wants and whether all the vital resources are available