{"id":54273,"date":"2018-07-23T12:28:17","date_gmt":"2018-07-23T10:28:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cesie.org\/news\/what-is-the-future-of-rural-areas-liverur-innovative-solutions-based-on-a-circular-economy\/"},"modified":"2025-07-01T12:22:59","modified_gmt":"2025-07-01T10:22:59","slug":"what-is-the-future-of-rural-areas-liverur-innovative-solutions-based-on-a-circular-economy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cesie.org\/en\/higher-education-and-research\/what-is-the-future-of-rural-areas-liverur-innovative-solutions-based-on-a-circular-economy\/","title":{"rendered":"What is the future of rural areas? LIVERUR: Innovative solutions based on a circular economy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Europe faces the challenge of creating smart, inclusive and sustainable growth <\/strong>at a time when an ageing population will leave 47 million fewer working-age people by 2060. It is visioned, that over the same period, over 100 million of Europeans will leave rural areas for cities<\/strong>, such migration has very negative impact on the agri-food sector, which has already declined from supporting more than 54 million jobs a decade ago to 45 million todays.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is an urgent need to extend the growth agenda beyond smarter cities<\/strong> to include Europe\u2019s rural regions<\/strong> which account for 77% of the continent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As so, the challenge is to develop models of growth and empower rural regions<\/strong> to capitalize on their distinctive territorial know how and turn diversity and demographic change into strengths<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Europe must act both to secure the future of the agri-food sector<\/strong> and to support rural regions in finding new forms of sustainable growth. Solutions to the challenge faced by rural regions are being developed at the local level in the form of Living Labs schemes<\/strong> that take advantage of unique local resources to create new business models and tools that generate sustainable local growth and prosperity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, such initiatives remain scarce and many rural regions do not have specific skills to foster such social innovation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To truly take advantage of social innovation as an engine of rural growth, Europe needs a mechanism for<\/strong> understanding the unique characteristics of each region and the tools to deliver tailored social innovation<\/strong> programmes on the ground.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

23 partners from 13 countries<\/strong>\u00a0join their experience and started the\u00a0Living Lab research concept in Rural Areas project - LIVERUR<\/a>\u00a0with the Kick off meeting on 26th<\/sup>\u00a0June in Murcia (Spain).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Challenges and key concepts of the projects were discussed, Murcia region rural areas were visited to collect existing rural experiences -\u00a0Foundation of Pedro Cano<\/a>, company of organic fertilizers in Abar\u00e1n, agricultural cooperative in Cieza - and the work plan for the next six months is confirmed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

LIVERUR in action<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

LIVERUR project faces the new challenges in the rural economy as a part of the global businesses<\/strong>. From one side, providing business models for the citizens<\/strong>, from other side, it manages the socio-economic networks<\/strong> among the increasingly demanding customers and markets when it comes to sustainability.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This poses a framework for LIVERUR:<\/p>\n\n\n\n