Inverness Enterprise Model, Highlands & Islands, Scotland
A rural ‘hub and spoke’ model

The Project

In order to promote an enterprise culture within the Highlands and Islands and to tackle the problem of the out-migration of young people, Highland Opportunity Ltd (HOL), Inverness, the Enterprise Trust for the Highlands, sought innovative solutions.

As part of the youngbusiness.net UK project, funded by the Big Lottery Fund, HOL and the Prince’s Scottish Youth Business Trust, with the support of the EDW team, focused on developing a ‘hub and spoke’ approach to youth enterprise incubation, providing a support structure for young people across the Highlands and Islands.

Background

The Highlands and Islands of Scotland are the most sparsely populated region of Britain and are becoming more so every year as a result of the- massive out-migration of young people, leaving to seek employment or further education. Less than 10% return annually to this dynamic and beautiful region. The landscape is dominated by mountain and moor land, much of it rising to over 300m high, and vast tracts of land are defined as areas of outstanding scenic beauty.

The out-migration of young people through lack of job opportunities is a real threat to communities across the Highlands, leaving small towns and villages with a depleted youth population, little infrastructure, a high number of retirement and holiday homes and a heavy dependence on seasonal tourist activity. It is not an exaggeration to say that these issues are symptomatic of communities under threat and that youth self-employment is seen as an option that can go a long way towards reversing this trend.

Meeting the need

Through the project, isolated communities of young people are benefiting from the innovative ‘hub and spoke’ model, with Inverness as the ‘hub’. For example, in Lochinver a programme has been developed to provide training for local enterprise community champions to provide outreach, awareness training and enterprise support to young people in sparsely populated areas across the region, while in Bonar Bridge, outreach and enterprise support is being provided through an ‘enterprise focus space’ on Bonar Bridge’s travelling ‘youth bus’.