From May 13th to May 15th, 2024, the members of the RURENER network gathered in Nagypali, Hungary for the annual event.
Closing of the LINK-EU project in Nagypali: validation and sharing of the Rural Resilience Roadmap.
Located in the Zalai hills, surrounded by forests and orchards, the village of Nagypáli is rapidly growing. Environmental awareness is important to the village and it led to the “Green Road“ village development program that began in 1997, impulsed by the newly elected mayor, Tibor Köcse. Its main goal is to develop into a self-sustaining settlement of an advanced European standard, preserving local and Hungarian traditions. Nagypáli’s strategy is centered around the deployment of renewable energy sources. The Energy Park, located in the center of the village, sets an example for other villages.
The Nagypáli model really attracted families, the population of the settlement increased from 271 people to now more than 650 people. The village has been rejuvenated in a quarter of a century, so it has not only a past, but also a future.
Organizing the final event of the LINK-EU project in Nagypali made sense to showcase a small rural municipality that committed to the energy transition over 3 decades ago and reached great achievements. It was not only inspiring for the participants, but also the opportunity to question local commitment to the social and ecological transitions, and everything it can bring to a rural community (attractiveness, resilience, economic development, etc.). The Rural Resilience Roadmap developed during the project is supporting many propositions that came from obstacles met by pilot communities like Nagypali, that started working on the topic before everyone else.
“What struck me was the development model: the Mayor has been implementing its transition programme since the 1990s, finding financial support from the E.U. when necessary, which allowed him to be trully innovative and to approach the energy transition in a more systemic way.” – Guillaume DHERISSARD, Mode d’Emplois, FRANCE.
You can check out the Rural Resilience Roadmap in the Publications section of the website.
LINK-EU, LINKing local democracy and solidarity to E.U. institutions for the design of resilient energy policies, cofunded by the E.U. through the Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values (CERV) programme, took place from 2022 to 2024 with the organization of 4 European events that led to the shaping of the Rural Resilience Roadmap. This document takes on good examples and difficulties faced by rural communities and formulates policy recommendations toward the E.U. institutions to better support sustainable rural development.
