Rieska LEADER

Finland as one of the most prominent countries in Europe in Leader’s work has 56 Local Action Groups (LAG) - registered non-governmental organizations, that are covering the whole country by their activities. The main purpose of these LAGs is to develop rural areas by funding local rural development projects and supporting local enterprises. The first LAGs in Finland were created in 1995, when the country joined the European Union, and they had found Finnish rural environment highly suitable for their activities. The Finnish Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry was encouraged by the plan achievement and success of the program period 1996-1999 and decided to extent LAGs’ work to the entire country and increase amount of the groups to 56 in program period 2000-2006.

Rieska-Leader LAG covers 8 municipalities (Ylivieska, Oulainen, Merijärvi, Alavieska, Kalajoki, Kannus, Kokkola, Sievi), where about 57 thousand people live. Activity of Rieska-Leader as well as other LAGs is directed on supporting projects of commercial and non-commercial organizations, mostly small ones and those, that just have started up. Participation in Leader’s program is open to all, but has strongly local focus. Being aimed on the development of local rural infrastructure the related LAG can appreciate any local initiative. For the first half of the program period 2007-2013 there were supported more than 100 organizations’ projects, where 50% are non-commercial ones.