Latest news
Upcoming webinars: MapWhiteboard, MAATool, and RAG/GeoRAG
The PoliRuralPlus webinar series continues with three exciting sessions dedicated to exploring interactive mapping, AI-assisted collaboration, and spatially enhanced generative AI. Each session highl
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From PoliRural to PoliRuralPlus: Slovak Rural Vision to Inform the National Tourism Strategy 2035
On 4 December 2025, representatives of the Rural Youth Parliament in Slovakia (VPMS) and the Slovak Rural Parliament met with the Ministry of Tourism and Sport of the Slovak Republic to discuss how k
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Local Voices Drive Circular Transformation in County Monaghan
Monaghan Integrated Development (MID) hosted the fourth PoliRuralPlus stakeholder meeting on 27 November 2025, bringing together local authorities, businesses, academics, and community groups to revi
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People – Place Bond: Mallusjoki and the bond between people and place
This short documentary explores the deep bond between people and the places they inhabit through the story of Mallusjoki, a rural village in Finland. The video follows the themes of place attachment
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Farming with Nature – Smart Water, Smarter Communities
As climate stress intensifies, Malta’s farmers face an old problem in urgent new ways: how to grow more with less water. At the MaYA Agri-Tech Ideathon, two teams approached this challenge from com
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Local First – Using AI to Strengthen Malta’s Local Food Markets - Winning Idea
When it comes to supporting local farmers, demand matters as much as supply. The winning concept of the MaYA Agri-Tech Ideathon, Go(v) Local First, proposed a simple but transformative idea:Governmen
Read morePoliRuralPlus Main aim
PoliRuralPlus extends and enriches the achievements of its predecessor, the PoliRural, by delving deeper into the complexities of rural and urban interconnectivity. It deploys a sophisticated suite of digital tools, including Artificial Intelligence, Geographic Information Systems, Internet of Things, and advanced data analytics. The project's core mission is to tackle prevalent issues such as administrative fragmentation, inequality, and inefficiencies
in public service coordination, fostering an environment of enhanced cooperation and equal opportunities across rural and urban divides. Central to PoliRuralPlus are 9 pilot projects that serve as proving grounds for an EU-wide integrated approach to territorial planning and action foresight. PoliRuralPlus ambitiously expands its scope to include the urban dimension, thus embracing a broader perspective on development.
PoliRuralPlus Objectives
To develop and implement a foresight-based framework for interregional cooperation and coordination, aimed at overcoming policy barriers and improving governance arrangements to foster integrated and smart rural-urban development strategies
To develop and implement integrated strategies and action plans that enhance the availability of business and innovation opportunities in rural areas, while promoting a more proximate, circular, and green economy and revitalising rural places through better connectivity, improved valorization of cultural and natural heritage, and stronger innovation ecosystems.
To enhance mutual access to services and social connectivity between rural and urban areas, as well as build resilience and capacity for innovation through the implementation of regional action plans and pilot initiatives.
Contribute to the implementation of the European Green Deal, with a specific focus on the farm-to-fork and biodiversity strategies, the organic action plan, the common agricultural policy (CAP), the long-term vision for the EU’s rural areas, the flagship initiative “Research and innovation for rural communities,” and the EU territorial agenda for 2030.
To enhance cross-disciplinary collaboration and leverage the full potential of European Research Infrastructures, EOSC, EU Data spaces, INSPIRE, Copernicus, DIAS, Eurostat, FAO, and other relevant data sources for integrated rural-urban development.
To facilitate mission-oriented experimentation and innovation by leveraging data-driven decision-making, collaborative analysis, and system dynamics to advance the development of a well-being economy based on proximity, circularity, green economy/society, services, culture, landscape and heritage, and mobility.
To create synergies with the New European Bauhaus (NEB) and other EU-funded projects, facilitating ideas flows from urban to rural settings and vice versa.
