One of the DLIST demonstration sites, in Hamburg in South Africa has received funding through a proposal by Aspire to develop an "Environmental and Skills Centre". Aspire is a Development Agency working in the Amathole District in the Eastern Cape, South Africa, whose mission is to stimulate locality development, with the objective of regenerating small town economies.

Hamburg is a small coastal community in the Eastern Cape. The beautiful landscape is rich with natural resources. However, most of inhabitants in the community are unemployed and depend largely on marine resources as well as social grants for their livelihoods.

During the time when the DLIST team were in Hamburg to assist with the development of a Local Economic Develop Plan for the community, we had several meetings with various stakeholders, including Aspire. During these meetings, it was determined that all stakeholders working in Hamburg can collaborate in order to work towards the improvement of the Hamburg community and not work as individual entities to serve personal interests.

Aspire applied for funding for the improvement of the town centre and their application was approved by the Neighbourhood Development Partnership Grant of National Treasury for components to revive the Hamburg town centre, one of them being the Environmental and Skills Centre. Aspire is working closely together with different organizations, such as the Sustainable Seas Trust and the EC Parks and Tourism Agency, which will hopefully play an important part in the running of the centre. It is great that good planning pays off. Let’s hope to see positive changes at the community level.

The DLIST team congratulates Aspire and Hamburg community and we hope things will commence soon! Such success stories should be shared with all communities in all the other demonstration sites as there many lessons learnt that can be useful to improve the situation in opther areas. We hope to see more interventions in other demonstration sites as well.

Nolusizo