Tyne Esk LEADER covers rural East Lothian and rural Midlothian, which includes both local authorities apart from Musselburgh and Dalkeith. A map showing the eligible area is available here.
There is funding available to strengthen these communities economically, socially and environmentally. This LEADER Programme has ring fenced budgets for farm diversification and rural enterprise businesses as well as community projects.
The first step to apply for this funding is completing an Expression of Interest form.
Tyne Esk LEADER is contained within Midlothian Council, which is the Accountable Body for the Programme but is governed by a decision making body called the Local Action Group comprising a wide range of members from the Midlothian and East Lothian community, from community groups, rural businesses, voluntary sector organisations, farming associations and so on. A Local Development Strategy was commissioned to evaluate the area and outline the challenges faced by the rural communities. Strategic objectives were created as part of this document for LEADER funds to target in order to address these challenges. The Local Development Strategy can be found here and a summary of the funding objectives is given here. The Business Plan outlining how the Local Action Group will disburse the money can be found here.
This section has a number of case studies from projects from the 2007-13 Programme which give an idea on the types of projects supported by LEADER. We will add projects to this section as they are awarded grants throughout the Programme.
