The EU funded LEADER programme sets out proposals to involve local communities in developing and testing innovative approaches to integrated and sustainable rural development. The programme focuses on local development strategies drawn up and implemented by local action groups (LAG's), essentially local partnerships, involving representative sectors of the local community. These strategies are implemented through small-scale, innovative projects addressing local rural development issues in socially, economically and environmentally sustainable ways.

The area Weidse Veenweiden is situated west of the city of Utrecht, in the middle of the Netherlands. It can be characterised as a peri-urban area. The LEADER method has been used in this area since 2002. In the period 2002 - 2008,  41 projects have been implemented this way, using 1.96 million Euro Leader-funding for a total investment of 7.2 million Euro. In the period 2007-2015, as many as 58 projects were implemented. Together they added up to a total investment of 12 million Euro of which 2,9 million was EU-funding. A multiplier of 4! In the LEADER period 2015 - 2022 27 projects received LEADER-funding. You can find them here. 

 After these successful programmes we can continue working with the LEADER-method in the LEADER period 2023 - 2027. The Local Action Group has made a new development strategy for the area. With this development strategy they will further promote grass-root initatives that bolster regional identity and boost the vitality of the rural area of Weidse Veenweiden.

The goals for 2023 - 2027 are: 

• Strong communities
  Develop multifunctional meeting spaces, promote local culture and heritage, and encourage new forms of living together. 
• Future prospects for agriculture, nature and landscape
  Increasing demand for local food, promoting new agricultural products, and local collaborations for sustainable land management. 
• Water puts the region on the map!

  Making the (water) landscape accessible and promoting partnerships for recreation and tourism. 
• Citizen Science - make knowledge together! 
  Knowledge sharing and development, through cooperation between residents and entrepreneurs and educational and knowledge institutions, targeting young people and strengthening the connection between city and countryside. 

Cooperation with other LEADER areas

In former LEADER-periods, our LAG has cooperated with other regions both within the Netherlands as with regions elsewhere in Europe. We have cooperated with the LAG Utrecht Oost on local food in both the LEADER-period 2007-2013 as in the LEADER-period 2014 - 2022. With Utrecht Oost and LEADER-regions in the province of Gelderland, we cooperated around the old Roman border, the Limes. This was in the LEADER-period 2007 - 2013. In that same LEADER-period we also cooperated with the Flemish region Pajottenland (B) and the French region Plaine de Versailles, also on local food. 

Last period we have paid an exchange visit to Pays des Condruses in Wallonia (B) together with our neighbour LAG Utrecht Oost. 

More information? Would you like to cooperate with us? 

Contact our LAG managers!