For the first time ever, the International Carnegie Rural Convention took place this week in Ireland. Hosted by Tipperary Institute, over 70 delegates from England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland took part in the 3 day event held in Cashel, Co. Tipperary.  A core focus of the Convention was the launch of the new 5 year Rural Development Programme of the Carnegie Trust whose main focus is the development of sustainable communities.  Historically the Carnegie organisation has funded and supported organisations in Great Britain. They now have a new Irish partner in their rural development work - Tipperary Institute - who are working with other partners from a wide variety of backgrounds. The partners include the Scottish government, The Eden Foundation, the Centre for Alternative Technology, Highlands and Islands Enterprise, the International Futures Forum, Irish Rural Link, the Omagh Forum and others.

The development of this partnership between Tipperary Institute and the Carnegie Trust is a major success for both the Institute and Tipperary itself.  Ciaran Lynch, Director of the Sustainable Rural Development Department at Tipperary Institute spoke of the partnership as a 'great opportunity to engage with similarly committed organisations across Great Britain and Ireland to address the urgent issues of climate change and resource depletion'.  On the partnership with Tipperary Institute Kate Braithwaite also echoes this optimism and believes that the Institute 'embodies the way we want to work, grounding the work in excellent rural development'. 

Over the 3 days, delegates visited a number of rural development projects across Tipperary. The projects included the Ardmayle Heritage Group, the Rural Transport Group in Kilcommon and the Millenium project in Glengoole. The delegates participated in the sharing of project details including the Tipperary Institute Partnership project on Integrated Area Planning at the Convention's meetings in Bru Boru.
According to one of the participants the Convention '..was great and allowed us the opportunity to meet a group of folk who embodied the values of their community and traditions'.  Kate Braithwaite, Director of the Rural Development Programme at Carnegie spoke highly of the people of Tipperary and described the convention as a 'privileged opportunity to meet this mixture of people'. 

The Carnegie UK Trust was set up in 1913 and is one of the main Foundations in Great Britain.  It is a not for profit organisation and describes itself as 'working to support a more just, democratic, peaceful and sustainable world'. In Great Britain and Ireland its rural development work seeks to empower communities by creating networks, and supporting action and research projects.

For more information about Carnegie, you can visit
www.carnegieuktrust.org.uk  

For further details about the partnership
between Tipperary Institute and Carnegie you can contact Catherine Corcoran at ccorcoran@tippinst.ie