Scotland: National Rural Network
Connecting Rural Scotland - Promoting Rural Growth

Over 1000 projects have been approved in the latest Rural Priorities round. Around £96.6 million will fund 1131 projects across the country including environmental, forestry and tourism projects. £34.6 million of this new funding will go to farms and rural businesses to help improve their competitiveness.

Projects include the conversion of a farm steading near Forres into a rural enterprise centre which will bring 50-70 jobs to the area, a new restaurant and guest house in the Western Isles and a plan to improve wildlife habitats in Angus.

Rural Secretary Richard Lochhead said, "Rural communities produce food and generate tourism - two of the key drivers powering the Scottish economy.

"Rural Priorities is of considerable importance to Scotland's Economic Recovery Programme, with £34.6 million of this new funding going directly to farming and rural businesses to help improve their competitiveness.

"Over a number of years, more than £60 million will also go towards environmental and forestry projects which will protect and improve Scotland's natural environment and help meet our targets on climate change. A large number of forestry projects in particular have been approved in this round, which will be valuable to the development of the sector."

"This has been another very successful round of assessments with interest in Rural Priorities now at record levels."

Rural Priorities is part of the Scottish Rural Development Programme. The November 2009 round was the sixth round of approvals. £257.8 million has now been approved, funding around 3,600 projects.

Look out for case studies from this round being added to the Projects Database in the next few days.

Break down of round six funding by area

• Argyll:                         102 - £6,439,527
• Ayrshire:                       58 - £2,927,731
• Borders:                       69 -  £6,153,445
• Clyde Valley:                 27 -  £2,114,414
• Dumfries and Galloway: 96 - £10,715,814
• Forth:                            57 - £8,196,272
• Grampian:                  350 - £25,384,103
• Highland:                   147 -  £19,209,446
• Northern Isles:                83 - £4,002,107
• Outer Hebrides:              29 - £1,997,353
• Tayside:                       113 - £9,491,499
• Total:                     1131 - £96,631,711

You can find out more on the Scottish Government website.

Image courtesy of spodzone on flickr.com. Link to original image.