Attending the Shared Language, Land and Different Drums – Cleenish Centre, Bellanaleck, Co Fermanagh were Dorothy Clarke, from IFI and Marella Rudden, Business Advisor and Chairperson of the Project Steering Committe of Cavan Enterprise Board with Chairman of Fermanagh Council, Alex Baird directly behind flanked by Linda Ervine, East Belfast Mission and Dr. Kirsten Lemon, Geological Survey of Norther Ireland. The Back row are Paddy Connaughton, Cathal O’Dolan, Anne Quinn, Kathleen Richie, Frankie McMurray and Catherine Ryan, IFI.
A CROSS-BORDER, cross-community project which provided assistance to the local business community and also saw 550 people participating in a total of 57 courses over its duration has been praised for its work in bringing people, and communities together.
The project’s four year tenure ended recently with a workshop in Arney.
The project targeted the private, community/voluntary and business sectors and, over the four year period, it worked with 15 active cross border community groups and 18 communities within the west Cavan/west Fermanagh area.
The idea was to address obstacles to social, community and economic prosperity and enterprise development in the area and, in particular, the underdevelopment of the local economy of this disadvantaged cross-border area.
Programme manager of the West Cavan West Fermanagh regeneration project Roisin McManus, a native of Enniskillen, said the project had exceeded all targets, and had proved to be a phenomenal success.
She commented: “Targets set for 225 people to participate on 20 courses have been more than doubled in that 550 people participated in 57 courses.
“It was projected that 220 people would attend networking events over the lifetime of the project. It attracted 602 participants.”
Four community forums were scheduled to take place with a minimum of 10 people attending each event, and at least 248 attended overall.
John Treacy, the chief executive of Fermanagh Enterprise Ltd, paid tribute to the project:
“By bringing people from both traditions together as part of an activities-based programme, the initiative has been tremendously successful in fostering greater interaction among participants and teaching the benefits of working together to achieve results,” Mr Treacy said.
“We believe the outcome of this project will continue to have a very positive impact for good relations and promoting greater cross-community links in the area”.
The Arney workshop, ‘Shared Language, Landscape and Different Drums’, held in the Cleenish Centre, Belnaleck celebrated the success of the project.
The programme received funding from the International Fund For Ireland.
One of its board member, Dorothy Clarke, explained that projects, such as this, were at the forefront of the IFI’s work.
She said the programme had allowed each participant gain a richer understanding of the conflict and its impact.
“It has been an important forum for the creation of cross-community conversation, and has achieved far more than anyone expected when we began this journey four years ago.”
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