CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Form­al Board Paper 5 12/03/2021

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

FOR INFORM­A­TION

Title: MAJOR PRO­JECTS UPDATE

Pre­pared by: GRANT MOIR, CEO

Pur­pose

This paper seeks the update mem­bers on the major pro­jects in the Cairngorms Nation­al park where the CNPA is account­able body or is a major fund­ing partner.

Recom­mend­a­tions

The Board is reques­ted to:

a) Note the updates in this report

Back­ground

1. The CNPA has taken for­ward a num­ber of major pro­jects as an organ­isa­tion over the past 5 years. This has involved lever­aging in a sig­ni­fic­ant amount of extern­al fund­ing that has con­trib­uted across the 4 Park aims. They are all part­ner­ship pro­jects involving many dif­fer­ent part­ners. The CNPA is account­able body fin­an­cially for 4 of the 5 (not TMTP) but the deliv­ery of these pro­jects is spread across many part­ners with part­ners con­trib­ut­ing fin­an­cially and with staff input.

2. The total fund­ing of these pro­jects is £15million (not includ­ing addi­tion­al LEAD­ER match fund­ing secured by applic­ants which equates to a fur­ther £1.5m). This is a sig­ni­fic­ant amount of fund­ing that the CNPA and part­ners has lever­aged through these pro­jects. The dir­ect fin­an­cial CNPA con­tri­bu­tion is £855,000. That is a lever­age rate of roughly £17.50 for every £1 inves­ted. That is a very high rate.

3. There has been con­sid­er­able CNPA staff input to these pro­jects over and above fund­ing con­tri­bu­tions espe­cially on the cor­por­ate side (HR, fin­ance, pro­ject man­age­ment, seni­or staff time). Board mem­bers have been involved dir­ectly with all of these pro­jects sit­ting on the Pro­ject Boards respons­ible for their delivery.

4. These pro­jects have all been iden­ti­fied in the Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plans and CNPA Cor­por­ate Plans and have been sub­ject to indi­vidu­al board papers as required, NPPP annu­al reports and Cor­por­ate Plan 6 monthly reports, as well as fin­an­cial inform­a­tion going to the Fin­ance and Deliv­ery Com­mit­tee at their meetings.

5. All the pro­jects are either Park-wide or, where they are related to spe­cif­ic geo­graph­ic areas, these have been iden­ti­fied in advance as spa­tial pri­or­ity areas with­in the NPPP

6. Finally, these major pro­jects deliv­er across all 4 aims of the Nation­al Park cre­at­ing sig­ni­fic­ant assets, employ­ment oppor­tun­it­ies, biod­iversity and land­scape bene­fits, cul­tur­al bene­fits, health bene­fits and much more. No pro­ject focusses on one aim and nev­er has.

7. The inform­a­tion in this paper cov­ers 5 major projects:

Name of Pro­ject	Major Fun­der	Stra­tegic context
Badenoch Great Place CNPA account­able body	NLHF	P67 NPPP 2017 – 2022 CNPA Cor­por­ate Plan 2018 — 2022
Cairngorms Caper­cail­lie Pro­ject CNPA account­able body	NLHF	P27 NPPP 2017 – 2022 CNPA Cor­por­ate Plan 2018 – 2022
The Moun­tains and the People OATS account­able body	NLHF	P66 NPPP 2012 – 2017 CNPA Cor­por­ate Plan 2018 — 2022
Tomin­toul and Glen­liv­et Land­scape Part­ner­ship CNPA account­able body	NLHF	P47 NPPP 2012 – 2017 P68 NPPP 2017 – 2022 CNPA Cor­por­ate Plan 2018 – 2022
LEAD­ER Pro­gramme CNPA account­able body	European Uni­on and Scot­tish Government	CNPA Cor­por­ate Plan 2018 – 2022 Loc­al Devel­op­ment Strategy

Pro­ject I – Badenoch Great Place Project

Pro­ject	Badenoch Great Place Project
Fun­der	Nation­al Lot­tery Her­it­age Fund
Aim of Project	Vis­ion — that by the end of 2021 Badenoch will be renowned as a place with­in the Cairngorms Nation­al Park with a strong char­ac­ter and iden­tity that is based on its dis­tinct­ive cul­tur­al heritage
	The Pro­ject aims are to deliv­er a Place: 1. Where there is a strong des­tin­a­tion with­in the Cairngorms Nation­al Park and Scot­land with a repu­ta­tion based on its her­it­age, where the many key her­it­age attrac­tions and fea­tures of interest are pro­moted to cre­ate a great vis­it­or exper­i­ence; 2. Where the rich her­it­age assets are turned into a wide range of exper­i­ences and eco­nom­ic opportunities;
	3. Where a wider range of people are more dir­ectly involved in caring for and present­ing the area’s her­it­age 4. Which is man­aged by a sus­tain­able part­ner­ship of organ­isa­tions and com­munit­ies who work and embed her­it­age at the heart of their plans.

Times­cale	Ori­gin­ally Apr 18 – Dec 20 but exten­ded to Oct 21 due to change in PO (Jan 20) and COVID
Over­all Fund­ing Package	£438,000 split as fol­lows: NLHF £352,000 (80.4%) (£175,400 received to date) Part­ners £86,000 (19.6%) • CNPA — £30,000 (upfront) • Trans­port Scot­land — £30,000 (upfront) • High­land Coun­cil — £6,000 (upfront) • HIE — £20,000 (to be claimed 2021)
Key Part­ners	CNPA, Vol­un­tary Action in Badenoch and Strath­spey, Badenoch Her­it­age, High Life High­land, The High­land Coun­cil, His­tor­ic Envir­on­ment Scot­land, Roy­al Zoolo­gic­al Soci­ety Scot­land, Trans­port Scot­land, Loc­al Businesses
	VABS employ and man­age the Pro­ject Officer.
	Oth­er part­ners about to become more involved as enter the final phase are: CBP & Vis­it Scotland
Pro­ject outline	Back­ground — In 2017, the Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan 2017 – 22 (NPPP) iden­ti­fied Badenoch as a ​“spa­tial pri­or­ity area” requir­ing focused invest­ment and assist­ance. This was based on iden­ti­fied socio-eco­nom­ic issues and the need to plan pos­it­ively for the impact caused by the dualling of the A9 between Inverness and Perth. Although vis­it­or num­bers to the CNP as a whole grow yearly, Badenoch has not benefited pro­por­tion­ately from this tour­ism expan­sion, yet it has two large vis­it­or attrac­tions and some of the best her­it­age sites and poten­tial exper­i­ences in the whole of the NP, indeed Scotland.
	The Pro­ject is being delivered through a pack­age of over 20 inter­con­nec­ted activ­it­ies that includ­ing research, visu­al, audio and digit­al mater­i­al cre­ation, des­tin­a­tion devel­op­ment, her­it­age cel­eb­ra­tion, train­ing, skills build­ing and mar­ket­ing and inter­pret­a­tion in all their forms.

The Pro­ject funds a Pro­ject Officer (PO) who is employed by VABS. The PO forms part of the Pro­ject Team (Liz Hende­r­son, Kar­en Der­rick & Gra­ham Fraser) who meet reg­u­larly to coordin­ate and deliv­er the Activ­ity Plan.

What has been achieved so far?

²⁰¹⁸⁄₁₉ — The first 18 months of the pro­ject were spent under­tak­ing the baseline research and sur­vey work (on which much of the con­tinu­ing activ­ity is based) and organ­ising a range of her­it­age based events and activ­it­ies in the loc­al area.

Out­puts included

• Iden­ti­fic­a­tion of top 77 (out of 3000+)sites in the area, asso­ci­ated stor­ies and themes
• Cre­ation of the Badenoch Story­lands brand,
• Devel­op­ment of a draft tour­ist route based on the iden­ti­fied themes
• Com­pre­hens­ive Gael­ic place name lan­guage study
• Explor­ing, cel­eb­rat­ing and get­ting involved in loc­al her­it­age, inc deliv­ery of 2018 and 2019 Her­it­age fest­ivals & oth­er events
• Work­ing with loc­al schools on her­it­age careers and visits

2020

The Cov­id pan­dem­ic res­ul­ted in the Pro­ject effect­ively los­ing the whole 2020 Spring/​Autumn sea­son, dur­ing which 90% of remain­ing pub­lic facing activ­it­ies were planned. NHLF agreed to extend the Pro­ject to Oct 21, enabling all these events to be moved to 2021. A full review of pro­ject actions and mile­stones was under­taken and a revised Activ­ity Plan and budget was approved by NHLF in Aug 20.

A sil­ver lin­ing to emerge has been the oppor­tun­ity for the pro­ject to ​“catch up” on devel­op­ing, cre­at­ing and col­lat­ing the baseline con­tent that is required to pop­u­late many of the pro­ject out­puts. Spe­cial­ists are cur­rently devel­op­ing a range of media includ­ing GIS map­ping, aer­i­al imagery of key her­it­age sites, 3D visu­al­isa­tions of 6 key sites, record­ing of stor­ies and songs and cre­ation and record­ing of music­al pieces

The web­site, https://​badenoch​story​lands​.com/ was launched at end of August 2020. It con­tin­ues to be pop­u­lated as con­tent is developed. A Badenoch Story­lands App is due to be launched in Spring 2021. It will be an ​“Area Des­tin­a­tion” App, show­cas­ing the her­it­age of the area and bring­ing it alive for vis­it­ors in mod­ern innov­at­ive ways. A vir­tu­al fest­iv­al was held in Oct 20.

Cur­rent Situation

The pro­posed tour­ist routes have evolved into sug­ges­ted itin­er­ar­ies for walk­ers, cyc­lists and drivers. These will identi­fy key her­it­age points of interest that can be either be phys­ic­ally vis­ited, viewed from afar or learnt about though digit­al medi­ums. The pro­ject is about to embark on a pro­gramme of work­ing with busi­nesses and com­munit­ies to refine fur­ther before launch­ing through the App and a mar­ket­ing cam­paign in late Spring 21 which should coin­cide with the pro­ject organ­ising famil­i­ar­isa­tion vis­its for trade bod­ies and launch­ing the area at Vis­it Scot­land Expo 21 (if it goes ahead).

Inter­pret­a­tion and mar­ket­ing plans are being developed and increas­ingly, BGPP will be look­ing to work more closely with loc­al busi­nesses, com­munit­ies and key stake­hold­ers to max­im­ise the oppor­tun­it­ies and poten­tial bene­fits that this pro­ject could bring for Badenoch, its res­id­ents and visitors.

A digit­al archive is being set up and skills build­ing work­shops for loc­al school­chil­dren will take place in May. As the pro­ject draws to a close it plans to host a con­fer­ence along with anoth­er 2 week fest­iv­al in Sep.

In many respects, the pro­ject is just the start of the jour­ney. It is put­ting in place the build­ing blocks from which it is hoped the com­munity and part­ners will con­tin­ue to devel­op the area to sus­tain a vibrant rur­al com­munity and a place tour­ists will choose to vis­it and pro­long their stay. The oppor­tun­it­ies to build on the work under­taken will be numer­ous and mul­ti­fa­ceted. To this end a Leg­acy Plan is being developed to help shape and guide future work bey­ond 2021. It will out­line how the invest­ment made dur­ing the pro­ject will be secured and developed for the future. The aspir­a­tion is that the leg­acy will facil­it­ate new pro­jects that will build on the com­munit­ies’ assets and res­ult in new oppor­tun­it­ies for ongo­ing com­munity benefit

2022 will be the Year of Scotland’s Stor­ies which will be a show­case of the country’s rich lit­er­at­ure, oral tra­di­tions and myths and legends. Badenoch should be well posi­tioned to bene­fit from the oppor­tun­it­ies that this year of cel­eb­ra­tion will bring and has the chance to become renowned for its rich cul­tur­al heritage.

Next Steps

• Deliv­er the remainder of deliv­ery plan to Oct 2021 and the Leg­acy Plan that has been approved by the Pro­ject Board

• Cul­min­a­tion of pro­ject is con­fer­ence on Badenoch cel­eb­rat­ing the area, the work under­taken and the cul­tur­al her­it­age of the Park

• Secure the spe­cial pri­or­ity status of Badenoch with­in the NPPP 2022 — 2027 to allow more time for focused part­ner­ship atten­tion on the area.

Pro­ject 2 – Cairngorms Caper­cail­lie Project

Pro­ject	Cairngorms Caper­cail­lie Project
Fun­der	Nation­al Lot­tery Her­it­age Fund
Aim of Project	To involve a wide range of people in find­ing ways people and caper­cail­lie can co-exist in the shared forests in the straths and glens; and play a part in secur­ing the long-term future of caper­cail­lie through hab­it­at cre­ation and fur­ther­ing under­stand­ing of the causes of decline.
Times­cale	June 2020 — July 2023
Over­all Fund­ing Package	Nation­al Lot­tery Her­it­age Fund £2,034,500 Pub­lic sec­tor (CNPA, NatureScot & Scot­tish Forestry) £149,000 SRDP (Forest Grant Scheme) £127,473 Trusts/​Charities/​Foundations/​Private (RSPB, Devel­op­ing Moun­tain Bik­ing in Scot­land, Bal­mor­al Estate, Rothiemurchus Estate, Seafield & Strath­spey Estates) £448,243 Non cash con­tri­bu­tions (RSPB) £27,897 Volun­teer Time £120,000 Total £2,907,113
Key Part­ners	NatureScot; Seafield and Strath­spey Estates; Forestry and Land Scot­land; Scot­tish Forestry; RSPB; Bal­mor­al Estate; Cairngorms Busi­ness Part­ner­ship; Devel­op­ing Moun­tain Bik­ing in Scot­land; Rothiemurchus Estate; Car­rbridge Caper­cail­lie Group; Brook Forestry, Groves Forestry, Badenoch & Strath­spey Trail Asso­ci­ation Note: Cairngorms LEAD­ER sup­port key in fin­an­cially assist­ing devel­op­ment phase of pro­ject which led to secur­ing cur­rent deliv­ery phase.

Pro­ject outline

The Cairngorms Caper­cail­lie Pro­ject brings togeth­er key com­munit­ies of place and interest to raise aware­ness, enable wider involve­ment in con­ser­va­tion, improv­ing and expand­ing hab­it­ats, fur­ther­ing our under­stand­ing and provid­ing resource to help secure the long-term future of caper­cail­lie in the Cairngorms. The approved pur­poses of the pro­ject are to:

1. Work with landown­ers to imple­ment plans to improve and man­age approx­im­ately 9,000 hec­tares of hab­it­at across six estates for the bene­fit of caper­cail­lie; enable landown­ers to play their part in caper­cail­lie con­ser­va­tion via a third-party grant scheme tar­get­ing land­hold­ings in caper­cail­lie areas.

2. Raise aware­ness and increase under­stand­ing of the chal­lenges facing caper­cail­lie through a vari­ety of means includ­ing social media activ­it­ies and events, a new online engage­ment plat­form, volun­teer work, a pub­lic app, new resources for schools and genet­ics analysis.

3. Empower com­munit­ies to help ensure the sur­viv­al of caper­cail­lie through com­munity- led con­ser­va­tion, by imple­ment­ing the Car­rbridge Caper­cail­lie Con­ser­va­tion Strategy and devel­op­ing, agree­ing and imple­ment­ing action plans with a fur­ther five com­munit­ies of place and interest: moun­tain bikers, vis­it­ors to Aber­nethy, Rothiemurchus & Glen­more, busi­nesses, a whole estate approach (Bal­mor­al) and a second com­munity of place .

4. Mon­it­or, test, and eval­u­ate ideas through­out deliv­ery, apply­ing learn­ing from the pro­ject to refine activ­it­ies includ­ing hab­it­at improve­ment work, sur­vey tech­niques, pro­mo­tion­al activ­it­ies and the com­munity action plan­ning model.

5. Devel­op an innov­at­ive and rep­lic­able mod­el for com­munity-led spe­cies con­ser­va­tion that enables com­munit­ies to suc­cess­fully coex­ist with their nat­ur­al her­it­age, shar­ing the project’s find­ings intern­ally and extern­ally with UK organ­isa­tions, and fur­ther afield, to cre­ate a leg­acy of learning.

Cur­rent Situation

Recruit­ment is com­plete. A Pro­ject Man­ager, Com­munity Ranger, Game­keep­er, Caper­cail­lie Advis­ory Officer, Caper­cail­lie Advis­ory Assist­ant, Com­mu­nic­a­tions Officer, Admin­is­tra­tion Officer and Pro­ject Officer are all now in post and form the Pro­ject Team. An Oper­a­tion­al Man­age­ment Team is also now in place.

Baseline sur­veys have been con­duc­ted to meas­ure the impact of the project’s hab­it­at improve­ment work and pred­at­or con­trol in tar­geted areas is under­way. A con­tract­or has been recruited to ana­lyse the genet­ic diversity of the caper­cail­lie pop­u­la­tion in the Nation­al Park using DNA extrac­ted from caper­cail­lie feathers.

The Car­rbridge Caper­cail­lie Group have pub­lished their pri­or­it­ies with­in the Car­rbridge Caper­cail­lie Con­ser­va­tion Strategy for the next six months; based on the com­munity con­sulta­tion res­ults, brood sur­vey res­ults and changes neces­sary in light of Cov­id-19. Com­munity-led action work with moun­tain bikers is con­tinu­ing to devel­op. A work­shop to identi­fy ways in which the pro­ject can help the busi­ness com­munity to help caper­cail­lie was hos­ted by the Cairngorms Busi­ness Part­ner­ship in early Decem­ber. And plans to under­take vis­it­or research in Aber­nethy, Rothiemurchus and Glen­more are under­way to help identi­fy ways to bet­ter meet the needs of vis­it­ors to the area in a way that also enables Caper­cail­lie to thrive.

Next Steps

• Sup­port the Car­rbridge Caper­cail­lie Group in deliv­er­ing the pri­or­it­ies in the Car­rbridge Caper­cail­lie Con­ser­va­tion Strategy and Action Plan
• Fur­ther work with com­munit­ies of interest, identi­fy­ing issues, estab­lish­ing pri­or­it­ies and con­sensus and devel­op­ing action plans.

• Launch of hab­it­at enhance­ment grant scheme and imple­ment­a­tion of Hab­it­at Improve­ment Plans on estates across the Nation­al Park

• Ana­lys­is of genet­ic material

• Imple­ment­a­tion of the com­mu­nic­a­tion plan for rais­ing aware­ness and understanding

More info — https://cairngormscapercaillie.scot/

Pro­ject 3 — The Moun­tains and the People

Pro­ject	The Moun­tains and the People
Fun­der	Nation­al Lot­tery Her­it­age Fund
Aim of Project	To improve, and engage people with, the key moun­tain paths in Scotland’s Nation­al Parks
Times­cale	May 2015 — June 2020 (Ext Dec 2020)
Over­all Fund­ing Package	Nation­al Lot­tery £3,250,000 OATS (inc part­ner sup­port) £833,000 LL&T NPA £520,000 Forestry & Land Scot­land £520,000 Nature Scot­land £202,000 CNPA £275,000 Total £5,600,000
Key Part­ners	Out­door Access Trust for Scot­land, Cairngorms NPA, Forestry & Land Scot­land, Loch Lomond & Trossachs NPA, and Nature Scotland.

Pro­ject outline

TMTP rep­res­ents the largest and most com­plex upland path part­ner­ship pro­ject ever to be under­taken in the UK. The pro­ject delivered a wide range of both phys­ic­al improve­ments as well as oppor­tun­it­ies for people to get involved with con­serving and learn­ing about the moun­tains with­in Scotland’s nation­al parks.

The TMTP pro­ject built and rebuilt more than 120km of paths at a cost of £5.6M. Walk­ers, landown­ers and con­ser­va­tion interests have seen remark­able upgrades to high pres­sure ​“front-line” upland paths in both nation­al parks, pro­tect­ing the moun­tain envir­on­ment with un-obtrus­ive yet dur­able builds.

Key out­puts from the pro­ject are:-

• 36 stu­dents com­pleted the SVQ2 in Envir­on­ment­al Con­ser­va­tion and 6 stu­dents com­pleted the SVQ3.
• Over 1400 volun­teer work days via 181 work parties.
• 45 moun­tain paths adop­ted through the ​‘Adopt a path’ scheme.
• A digit­al learn­ing pack designed for the sec­ond­ary schools curriculum.
• Extens­ive and mul­ti­pli­er engage­ment actions: train­ing pro­mo­tion, open pub­lic events, high­er level health walks, pro­mo­tion­al leaf­lets, films, art­icles and presentations.
• Repair of over 120km of upland paths in Scotland’s nation­al parks (53 km in Cairngorms Nation­al Park).

Cur­rent Situation

The five year pro­ject came to an end in Decem­ber 2020 (exten­ded from June 2020 due to Cov­id-19 restric­tions). A final end of year report is being agreed with the key part­ners to be sub­mit­ted to Nation­al Lot­tery in Janu­ary 2021.

Next Steps

Col­lect­ively, form­ally com­plete the 5 year Nation­al Lot­tery Bid and cel­eb­rate the con­sid­er­able achieve­ments of Moun­tains and People Project

Agree with OATS CNPA sup­port for the com­mit­ted 10 year main­ten­ance of the path improve­ments delivered by the pro­ject (part­ner­ship agree­ment in dis­cus­sion) and col­lect­ively con­sider ways, with landown­ers, that such main­ten­ance can be sustained.

Agree with part­ners the poten­tial and oppor­tun­it­ies to use the Adopt A Path scheme nation­ally to encour­age volun­teers to provide use­ful and useable path con­di­tion data on paths across Scot­land a wider oppor­tun­ity than just moun­tain paths.

Offer volun­teers engaged with TMTP the oppor­tun­ity to sup­port Volun­teer Cairngorms

Fur­ther engage with part­ners includ­ing Cairngorms Trust on devel­op­ing ways that vis­it­ors not only volun­teer to main­tain paths but ways that sig­ni­fic­ant giv­ing can be tri­alled to raise funds to main­tain the paths of Cairngorms.

Annex I Moun­tain Paths in Cairngorms upgraded, repaired and rebuilt

Path Name & Length (metres)

Deeside

UL-13 Mount Keen* 2005

UL-14 Loch­nagar Main Path* 2494

UL-15 Loch­nagar Plat­eau Path 2306

UL-16 Meikle Pap 286

UL-17 Glas Allt path 1410

UL-17 Glas Allt Bridge 6

UL-18 Dubh Loch 2853

UL-33 Mount Keen (Mounth path) 1560

UL-19 Cor­rie Chash and Broad Cairn 1443

Coire na Ciste 2270

Total 16,633 m

Angus Glens

UL-20 Glit­ter­ing Skel­lies 1078

UL-21 Jock’s Road* 598

UL-22 The Snub — Loch Brandy 2904

UL-30 Mayar 3184

UL-31 Dre­ish 2497

UL-32 Mayar-Dre­ish sum­mit 2080

Roy Tait Memori­al Bridge 6

Total 12,347 m

Highland/​Perthshire

UL-37 A’ Mhar­con­aich from Balspor­ran Cot­tages* 2710

UL-39 A’ Mhar­con­aich to Geal-charn 3872

UL-40 Cairn Liath (Beinn a Ghlo)* 5942

UL-41 Air­g­oid Bheinn (Beinn a Ghlo) 5460

UL-42 Beinn a Ghlo return 3796

UL-44 Allt Gar­gh Buidhe (upper Glen Tilt) 1063

Total 22,843 m

TOTAL CAIRNGORMS 51,823 m

Or 51.8 km 32.2 miles.

More info — https://​themoun​tain​sandthep​eople​.org​.uk/

Pro­ject 4 – Tomin­toul and Glen­liv­et Land­scape Partnership

Pro­ject	Tomin­toul and Glen­liv­et land­scape Partnership
Fun­ders	Nation­al Lot­tery Her­it­age Fund
Aim of Project	Improv­ing Her­it­age • To take action to restore, con­serve and enhance import­ant nat­ur­al and built her­it­age fea­tures for a sus­tain­able future.
	Learn­ing about Her­it­age • To provide oppor­tun­it­ies for people to par­ti­cip­ate in, or be sup­por­ted to, record and research ele­ments of the nat­ur­al and cul­tur­al her­it­age of the area.
	Enga­ging with Her­it­age • To provide bet­ter access to the area’s rich her­it­age through enga­ging and inspir­ing inter­pret­a­tion — as well as improv­ing footpaths.
	We will make the area a bet­ter place to be by devel­op­ing events and cel­eb­ra­tions for loc­als and visitors.
Times­cale	Nov 2016- Feb 2021
Over­all Fund­ing Package	£3,594,553 Nation­al Lot­tery Her­it­age Fund £2,338,100 Moray Coun­cil £200,000 CNPA £200,000 Crown Estate Scot­land £200,000 High­lands and islands Enter­prise £200,000 European Uni­on – LEAD­ER, SRDP £320,000 Chiv­as £20,000 Trusts/​Charities/​Foundations £17,900
Key Part­ners	The Pro­gramme Board with rep­res­ent­at­ives of the fol­low­ing organ­isa­tions: • Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity • Tomin­toul & Glen­liv­et Devel­op­ment Trust • Crown Estate Scot­land • High­lands & Islands Enter­prise (Moray) • His­tor­ic Envir­on­ment Scotland

Pro­ject outlines

Improv­ing heritage

• Peesie Pro­ject ‑wet­land hab­it­at improve­ments, new bird-hide & interpretation
• Our Water Envir­on­ment – (Slow­ing the flow, water mar­gin man­age­ment & fish bar­ri­er ease­ment) – 3 pro­jects to improve the water envir­on­ment in Spey catchment
• Scalan Mills — build­ings secured, recor­ded, visited
• Blairfindy Castle — secured, mar­keted and opened to public

Learn­ing about heritage

• Train­ing & skills – skills devel­op­ment, espe­cially young people

• Oral his­tory — loc­al stor­ies cap­tured through and made access­ible online

• Access- Spey­side way spur and improved access

• Fish­ing for the Future — pro­mo­tion of fish­ing espe­cially young people
• Com­munity Cul­tur­al Her­it­age — activ­it­ies and train­ing provided for loc­al people
• Com­munity Nat­ur­al Her­it­age — activ­it­ies offered and grants for com­munity projects
• Edu­ca­tion new loc­ally centred edu­ca­tion opportunities
• Our her­it­age school — pupils cre­ate her­it­age films

Enga­ging with heritage

• Dis­cov­ery Centre — new com­munity offices, digit­al archive and vis­it­or facil­it­ies part fin­anced with sup­port of Cairngorms LEADER
• Inter­pret­a­tion & digit­al – new inter­pret­a­tion to sup­port oth­er pro­jects and loc­al mar­ket­ing archive
• Events & cel­eb­ra­tion — of the area’s heritage
• Access improve­ments — new paths, bet­ter signposting
• Wood­land improve­ments new wood­lands created
• Dark Skies Park — des­ig­nated, pro­moted and enhanced
• Land­scape her­it­age & song — work­shops & events

Cur­rent Situation

The full pro­gramme of over 20 pro­jects was due for com­ple­tion at the end of Septem­ber 2020, but we exten­ded the NLHF Grant Expiry Date to the end of Feb­ru­ary 2021 to accom­mod­ate delays caused by Cov­id 19 restrictions.

Next Steps

The Tomin­toul & Glen­liv­et Land­scape Part­ner­ship pro­gramme is com­ing to an end, but it was always envis­aged that it would lead to fur­ther pro­gress in the area. A new ​‘Leg­acy Board’ brings togeth­er loc­al groups and key agen­cies to over­see fur­ther devel­op­ments and mar­ket­ing of the area and all the many assets cre­ated and restored by the TGLP programme.

More info — https://​www​.tomin​toulandglen​liv​et​.com/

Pro­ject 5 – LEADER

Pro­ject	LEAD­ER 2014 – 2020 Programme
Fun­der	Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment / European Union
Aim of Project	LEAD­ER is a bot­tom-up meth­od of deliv­er­ing sup­port to com­munit­ies for rur­al devel­op­ment: also known as Com­munity Led Loc­al Devel­op­ment. Grants are awar­ded by Loc­al Action Groups (LAGs) to pro­jects that sup­port deliv­ery of a Loc­al Devel­op­ment Strategy.
	The aim of LEAD­ER is to increase sup­port to loc­al rur­al com­munity and busi­ness net­works to build know­ledge and skills, and encour­age innov­a­tion and cooper­a­tion in order to tackle loc­al devel­op­ment objectives.
	The Author­ity acts as the Account­able Body (AB) to the Cairngorms LAG: provid­ing fin­an­cial stew­ard­ship, gov­ernance sup­port and risk management.
	While this was the third LEAD­ER Pro­gramme sup­por­ted by the Author­ity as the AB, it was nov­el for: • The LAG one of only 2 in Scot­land incor­por­ated as char­it­able entit­ies; • An expan­sion and real focus through a LEAD­ER approach in sup­port­ing rur­al busi­nesses and farm diver­si­fic­a­tion, which was extremely suc­cess­ful in Cairngorms.
Times­cale	2014 March 2021
Over­all Fund­ing Package	Alloc­a­tion from Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment (for SLA deliv­ery) £3,043,436.70 Alloc­ated to pro­jects (LEAD­ER awards) as at Novem­ber 2020. £2,466,158.66 Total pro­ject value (includ­ing match fund­ing) £4,004,096.31 CNPA con­tri­bu­tion (pro­por­tion of admin sup­port costs) Approx £300,000
Key Part­ners	CNPA, SNH, VABs, Marr Area Part­ner­ship, LEAD­ER teams from Aber­deen­shire, Moray, High­land, Perth & Kinross and Angus, CBP.

Pro­ject outline

Cairngorms LEAD­ER 2014 – 2020 Loc­al Devel­op­ment Strategy pri­or­ity invest­ment themes:

1. Build Com­munity Capa­city to Facil­it­ate and Sup­port Loc­al Devel­op­ment Through Part­ner­ship Working.
2. Grow the Eco­nomy of the Park by Strength­en­ing Exist­ing Busi­ness Sec­tors, Sup­port­ing Busi­ness Start-ups and Diver­si­fic­a­tion, and Increas­ing the Num­ber of Work­ers Employed in the Park
3. Attract, Sup­port and Retain Young People in the Nation­al Park.
4. Improve Trans­port, Con­nectiv­ity and Ser­vice Provision
5. Pro­tec­tion and Enhance­ment of the Nation­al Park Land­scape, Wild­life and Loc­al Heritage
6. Excel­lence in Sus­tain­able Tour­ism and Recre­ation to Enhance Enjoy­ment of Res­id­ents and Visitors

Cross cut­ting themes:

Equal­ity, Know­ledge shar­ing, Innov­a­tion, Part­ner­ship work­ing, Sustainability

Cur­rent Situation

Pro­ject Alloc­a­tion com­mit­ment was final­ised in Decem­ber 2019.

Το Novem­ber 2020 pro­jects have drawn down £1,963,289 of an avail­able £2,466,302 (79.6%) We anti­cip­ate near to 100% by pro­gramme clos­ure which on 23 Decem­ber was announced to be exten­ded until end Decem­ber 2021 rather than the planned clos­ure date of 31 March. This exten­sion has a min­im­al impact for Cairngorms LEAD­ER as the pro­gramme is near com­ple­tion, while allow­ing for some oppor­tun­it­ies to com­plete and pos­sibly add to the remain­ing live projects.

Total increase on LEAD­ER cost (grant vs total pro­ject cost) is 162%. This is some­what lower than nation­al aver­age. How­ever, a num­ber of LAG areas have not util­ised their full alloc­a­tion. Cairngorms LAG have sought to bal­ance the attrac­tion of addi­tion­al match fund­ing to pro­jects with man­aging a full com­mit­ment of grant.

The pro­jects fun­ded and com­mis­sioned have achieved deliv­ery against all 6 LDS tar­gets and met all cross-cut­ting themes.

LEAD­ER fund­ing has been alloc­ated to all com­munit­ies of the CNP, either through dir­ect funds or via Park-wide projects.

Next Steps

As a European Uni­on fund, we lose access to LEAD­ER fund­ing with the end of this programme.

The con­tinu­ation of some form of nation­al fund­ing for CLLD is pri­or­it­ised as a key issue for con­tin­ued deliv­ery of cur­rent NPPP pri­or­it­ies on com­munity devel­op­ment, and seni­or man­age­ment expect this will remain a pri­or­ity into the next NPPP.

The Author­ity has been act­ive in influ­en­cing the replace­ment of this fund. The Dir­ect­or of Cor­por­ate Ser­vices is the lead rep­res­ent­at­ive for the Scot­tish LEAD­ER Net­work on the Scot­tish Government’s Rur­al Eco­nomy Work­ing Group. We cur­rently under­stand that there is high level gov­ern­ment com­mit­ment to con­tinu­ation of some form of CLLD.

On the replace­ment of LEAD­ER fund­ing, the UK Government’s ​“Shared Prosper­ity Fund” is under­stood to be the vehicle through which pre­vi­ously EU fun­ded pro­grammes will be replaced. How­ever, it remains highly uncer­tain wheth­er this will cov­er CLLD and any mech­an­isms that will be deployed should it cov­er LEAD­ER replace­ment fund­ing. We con­tin­ue to work as closely as pos­sible with Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment on the evol­u­tion of LEAD­ER replace­ment funds.

Fur­ther info — LEAD­ER 2014 – 2020 Pro­gramme Loc­al Devel­op­ment Strategy Cairngorms Trust

Con­clu­sion

1. The CNPA and its part­ners have suc­cess­fully levered in fund­ing to deliv­er the Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan. The les­sons learned from the each of the pro­jects will be con­cluded at the end of each of the pro­jects and will be taken to the rel­ev­ant CNPA Board Com­mit­tee for dis­cus­sion. It is key that we con­tin­ue to learn what worked well and what could be done bet­ter as we look at oth­er fund­ing mech­an­isms to deliv­er future NPPP outcomes.

Grant Moir CEO 12 March 2021