Raising Awareness in Local Communities

Awareness of involved actors regarding landscape values and of the connection between the landscape and the locals is one of the key factors of successful implementation. Awareness raising has to be based on personal contacts and the experience from the exchange between the locals, who will be affected by the plans and actions and the experts who develop those plans and actions. Since encouraging the dialog between the inhabitants and their environment is a driving force for smart sustainable and inclusive growth and for strengthening identity, encouraging local engagement is indispensable throughout the stages of the project. Questionnaires, workshops with decision makers, festivities, exhibitions, guided visits and other activities involving people are constituents of the knowledge-spreading process that links all involved actors (COE 2008:49-50).