Supporting Community Development

Most communities within the National Park now have their own Development Trust or Community Company. These are essentially community businesses, established in order to deliver a social or environmental benefit for the local community. They often own and run an asset such as a hall, hydro scheme or campsite and must reinvest the profit in the community. Through this social enterprise model, communities can become increasingly independent and empowered.

The National Park Authority works with a number of partners to provide communities with the support they need to achieve more for themselves. This may be for one off projects and events or for longer term aspirations such as developing an income generating asset or community owned housing.

Partner organisations include:

The Social Enterprise Academy                 Community Ownership Support Service                 GrowBiz

Cultural Heritage Network

An objective of the National Park Partnership Plan is to safeguard and promote the National Park’s cultural heritage and provide opportunities for everyone to experience and learn about the National Park’s outstanding historic environment, history and culture. In support of this objective the Cairngorms National Park Authority commissioned Scottish Community Tourism Network (SCOTO) in December 2023 to investigate the establishment of a Cultural Heritage Network that brings people together and adds value to those most closely involved in cultural heritage across the National Park. This piece of work was designed to inform the next steps.

Read the Cultural Heritage Network report

Community Empowerment

Community Empowerment is about giving a community the right tools and support needed to help them do more for themselves. Every community with The Park has been empowered to develop its own community action plan. These are reviewed and updated on a 5-year cycle.

The Community Empowerment Act has brought in a range of provisions which can be summarised as:

• Community Planning Partnerships (CPP) – additional duties for public bodies to collaborate on service delivery and involve communities to a greater extent
• Community Right-to-Buy – giving communities the right to buy land or property for the benefit of the wider community.
• Asset Transfer Requests – giving some community groups the right to request the transfer of ownership of a public asset to the community group
• Participation Requests – some community groups have the right to request direct involvement in service planning and design. The Participation Requests provision applies to the Cairngorms National Park Authority.  If you would like to find out more about how this works, please contact [email protected]

Scottish Rural Parliament

The Scottish Rural Parliament was established in November 2014 with the purpose of giving a stronger, more coherent voice to Scotland’s rural communities and enable them to engage more effectively with government at all levels.

The Rural Parliament is also about empowerment and has the potential to provide a real opportunity for rural communities in Scotland to take greater control of the decisions which affect them. It meets biannually in different locations around Scotland.