Cornwall Takes the Lead
Cornwall Council press release
Cornwall Council, working with Combined Universities in Cornwall (CUC), will act as the lead partner in a new project looking at the way universities and colleges can work hand-in-hand with local government in rural areas to bring sustainable economic growth.
The ?2.1m project, known as UNICREDS (Universities in Collaborative Regional Development Strategies), is one of only 74 projects out of over 500 applicants to receive the go-ahead from the EU's Interreg IVc funding programme in November.
The UNICREDS bid was prepared by Cornwall Development Company staff, working with 15 partners from across Europe. Starting with a project launch in Cornwall in Spring 2010, UNICREDS partners will get involved in a series of workshops and conferences in the 6 participating nations, culminating in the publication of policy recommendations based on the best ideas and examples from all partners.
The aim is to propose a new model for regional development based on the high value knowledge economy which other rural, peripheral regions of Europe could choose to follow.
Carolyn Rule, Cornwall Council cabinet member for the Economy and Regeneration, said: "Education and the influential work of the Combined Universities of Cornwall is vitally important to the success of the Cornish economy. The knowledge economy plays an ever increasing role in Cornwall and this new funding will enable us to look at new and profitable ways of working in partnership with the CUC."
Carleen Kelemen, Director of the Convergence Partnership, said: "At its heart the Combined Universities in Cornwall is about economic transformation. The CUC, its combined outreach and engagement, is the basis for driving a more productive and higher value economy.
"This investment began with Objective One and will continue with both the ERDF and ESF Convergence Programmes funding those activities that strengthen the links between academia and business. In less than 10 years the CUC has, as a collective, already achieved what more established academic institutions have taken decades to do in terms of creating local pools of new knowledge, raising aspirations and supporting economic regeneration."
Dr Sue Brownlow, CUC Director, said: "With EU investment through the Objective One and Convergence programmes, Cornwall has put university education at the heart of its emerging knowledge economy in the past decade. To achieve this we have rewritten the rules on how universities and colleges work with one another and with a wider network of local and national government partners.
"UNICREDS gives us the chance to help other regions to benefit from the pioneering work already done in Cornwall, and to learn from different approaches to the same challenges that are being developed elsewhere."
The UNICREDS announcement follows the award of a prestigious green flag for education and skills in the Audit Commission's Comprehensive Area Assessment for Cornwall last week, which singles out the success of Combined Universities in Cornwall for praise.