First Rural Youth Action Network Residential

First Rural Youth Action Network residential in Inverness

Inverness was witness to the first Rural Youth Action Network residential on 28 February and 1 March. Around 60 young people local to rural areas in Scotland gathered at the Inverness Royal Highland Hotel to discuss what they want their future to look like and engage with government officials.

The aim of the Rural Youth Action Network, delivered in partnership between Youth Scotland and Scottish Rural Action, is to enable young people to have an influencing role in policy making, cooperate and collaborate with one another and support the creation of a youth-led platform for rural young people, enabling them to share ideas and resources for the development of their local communities.

Day 1 started with some icebreakers, which provided attendants a chance to get to know each other and discover how far afield their companions had travelled from. Attendants had travelled all over Scotland, mostly the day prior, to rendezvous in Inverness. Participants had come from all over the country, from Shetland to the borders.

The first session of day 1 included a privilege wheel. Participants were distributed into groups depending on what area they are local to and asked to rank the services they can access in their local areas. This exercise sparked very interesting conversations on the different needs of different communities.

Engagement with MSPs and policymakers

Once the ice was broken and young people had taken some time to think what is missing in their communities, and what changes they would like to see moving forward, we listed to the Scottish Government Rural Policy team. This was an informative session that allowed young people to better understand where the power to change things lies in relation to each of their priorities.

SRA led a session where young people had the space to highlight issues that were the most important to them. The group used the information that Scottish government had previously provided to draft a plan on what issues they should raise with MSPs the following day.

Four MSPs attended the residential at different times. Mairi Gougeon (Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs, Land Reform and Islands), Emma Rodick (MSP for Highlands and Islands) and Rhoda Grant (MSP for Highlands and Islands) engaged with young people through roundtables. Ariane Burgess joined a group of young people earlier in the day in their beach clean.

Beach Clean and site visits

One of the groups of young people took part in a beach clean, but they didn’t just clean. Nairn Green Hive hosted a session where they showed young people which of the plastics brought to our beaches by the tides can be recycled and repurposed. Nairn Green Hive has made benches from recycled plastics that can now be used by the whole community, offering an incredible example of circular economy and climate action.

Ariane Burgess met young people at the beach and helped cleaning while listening to similar initiatives young people had seen before or had thought of brining to their own communities.

Other groups visited a croft, went on an art and health walk and worked on making zines. A huge thank you to Nairn Green Hive, Pathways for Wellbeing and Arts in Nature, Knockfarrel Croft and DeZine.