The Rural Revolution - Youth against Desertification

The idea for this project came as a consequence of the reality of the community where Selfmade is based. Our organization is based in Fundão, a region surrounded by several small villages that all battle a specific issue: Rural Shrinkage and Desertification. Throughout the last year, we implemented two projects in Castelo Novo, Fundão, and we were met face to face with this reality. Castelo Novo, as of now, has around 300 inhabitants only, and close to no young people despite being a village that oozes culture and history.
According to the Policy Brief, Shrinking rural regions in Europe: “Demographic change in Europe is increasingly becoming a major policy challenge. Predominantly rural regions currently account for 28% of Europe’s population.” (...) “By 2050, the population of Europe’s urban regions is projected to increase by 24.1 million persons and will provide a home to almost half of the EU-28 population (Eurostat 2016). By contrast, the population of predominantly rural regions is projected to fall by 7.9 million.” (Shrinking rural regions in Europe)
Rural shrinkage is both a demographic and economic phenomenon, interpreted as part of wider trends in European territorial restructuring. Economic and employment growth has become progressively tertiarised, favouring larger urban centres. “Selective job-related out-migration from rural to urban regions, particularly of younger and well-educated workers, can result in persistent slow-leak depopulation, divestment and a negative natural population balance.” (Shrinking rural regions in Europe)
Therefore, Rural Shrinkage is an indicator of a much broader structural crisis of economic and labour market decline and peripheralisation, which has also deepened the urban-rural divide and increased inherent disadvantages in rural areas. This hurts not only the communities and their future, but also culture and its current young residents.
“By 2011, just over 40% of European regions were experiencing depopulation.” (Shrinking rural regions in Europe)
As solutions, we should focus on the revitalization of rural areas through the creation of leisure spaces, festivals to attract not only the eyes of tourists but also to create attractions to retain the young people living there, construction of sports fields and gymnasiums to encourage the practice of sports among the rural population, increase of services available in these areas, technical assistance and youth associations to involve local youth in rural innovation, participation in rural youth policies and to improve their areas.
With this project we intend to fight the rural exodus, bringing together rural and non-rural young people from 5 European countries where 3 of them will be countries with a higher percentage of aging population living in rural areas and 2 with a lower percentage of aging population living in the same areas and create a debate where we will raise awareness about the rural exodus, explaining the concept, the advantages/disadvantages, the opportunities/tools and incentives at regional, national and European level that a rural, or non-rural young person, if they move from the city to the countryside, can take advantage of. Thus, we want to encourage youth to innovate and try to be the spark of change for their communities.
Our belief, through personal experience and also by testimonies of other youngsters, is that a more efficient and practical way of learning, is through Non-Formal Education (NFE), through which we can achieve our objectives: educate youngsters on this issue and discuss solutions together, after the passing of effective tools, skills and concepts, that aid in this process. As such, the objectives of this project are:

Raise the awareness of 25 youngsters about the problem that is Rural Exodus, Shrinkage and Desertification and how it threatens communities and cultures;

Promote Social Entrepreneurship as means to fight Rural Exodus, Shrinkage and Desertification and tools for personal development and professional/career growth;

Share tools, as well as, Local, Regional, National and European Incentives that already exist and are meant to fight these phenomena;

Promote sustainable green ideas, practices and businesses, as well as the advantages and challenges of implementing these in Rural Areas;

Brainstorm and come up with innovative ideas to fight Rural Exodus, Shrinkage and Desertification with 25 youngsters from different backgrounds (urban and rural);

Raise awareness on the topic of rural shrinkage and rural innovation by publishing 5 short films developed by 25 participants;

Connect young people from different backgrounds and countries to listen to and appreciate each others' ideas and experiences, endorsing intercultural understanding, democracy, respect, diversity, human rights, active citizenship, and EU citizenship;

Enable young people to be architects of their own lives, support their personal development and growth to autonomy, build their resilience and equip them with life skills to cope with a changing world;