WORK has begun to create a centre for excellence to accelerate the growth and impact of community wealth-building across Scotland.
The Economic Development Association Scotland (EDAS) has launched a new online platform as a hub to help inspire, encourage and guide greater action to create fairer, wealthier local economies.
Its Community Wealth Building Centre for Excellence has been created with support from the Scottish Government as part of a programme which will include special events, sharing of case studies and a new guide to community wealth building.
Resources will be built up over the coming months and stand as go-to assets for local authorities, enterprise agencies, businesses and community organisations as increasing numbers embrace the economic development model.
The Centre for Excellence is being created after first minister John Swinney pledged to bring forward a Community Wealth Building Bill in this parliamentary year.
It also follows a report commissioned as part of the Scottish Government’s national strategy for economic transformation, which concluded that tripling the number of inclusive and democratic businesses in Scotland would significantly transform the national economy.
Chair Neil McInroy, an internationally recognised expert in community wealth building, said: “We are at a pivotal point in the development and growth of community wealth building across Scotland, the impact of which can be transformational.
“If approved, the new legislation will help to amplify the agenda and the good work already taking place.
“It will put the creation of local wealth at the heart of a fairer, greener economy that benefits people, the planet, and the place.
“This centre for excellence is just one of the means by which we can help empower organisations of all kinds to take the kind of action which ultimately puts more money in peoples’ pockets while making communities stronger and more sustainable.”
Community wealth building aims to emphasise how wealth is distributed within an economy giving local people a greater stake in it and the new model is built in five pillars including inclusive ownership, workforce, finance, land and property and spending.
The first event in the Centre for Excellence event series will be on plural ownership, which will bring Scottish and international examples into the spotlight, it will take place online between 2pm and 3:15pm on December 10.
Neil added: “Our hope is that the centre for excellence will deepen the understanding, experience and conversation about all that’s happening around community wealth building in Scotland.
“This will be all grist to the mill in terms of popularising community wealth building and see it play an increasingly important part in economic development across Scotland.
“Our work over the months ahead will help people understand how they can get behind this – ultimately helping to turn the dial on poverty, inequality and the climate crisis.”
