Challenge with Associació d'Iniciatives Rurals de Catalunya (ARCA)

We remind you that the participation in different calls is not incompatible, so the same company can provide solutions to all the calls in which they are interested as long as they offer innovative and adapted solutions to the proposed challenges.

Awards:

• Best solution award: 15.000 € + Pilot of the solution with Associació d’Iniciatives Rurals de Catalunya (ARCA).

• Second prize: 3.000 €

• Third prize: 2.000 €

• Extraordinari award from Associació Catalana de Municipis (ACM) & Associació de Micropobles de Catalunya (AMC): 8.000 € for doing the pilot of the solution

Calls:

Call 1: Proximity alimentation and circuits

How can we promote the sales of local, craft and quality products of the small Catalan producers?

Nowadays in Catalonia there is a wide network of artisans and small producers who elaborate high quality and proximity agri-food products. Nonetheless, in many occasions these small producers suffer hardships when commercializing their products in the market, this fact supposes an important hindrance for achieving a bigger and more consolidated demand.

The objective of this call is to develop an innovative solution able to enhance and foster the commercialization and sells of these agri-food products.

Call 2: Transportation and rural mobility

How can we ease and favor mobility among the rural population for having access to basic goods and services?

People who live in rural areas must frequently face important hardships for having access to basic goods and services (education, health, culture, commerce, etc.). It is common that, in order to have access to them, they are forced to rely on private and/or public transport. Therefore, those villagers who do not own a private vehicle and who cannot enjoy the benefits of an efficient public transportation system must undergo important hardships when having access to the goods and services they need.

This call is looking for an innovative solution able to ease and favor mobility among the rural population in order to have access to the basic goods and services that they need for guaranteeing and enrichening their quality of life.

Call 3: Daily health assistance of quality

How can we offer non-urgent and from distance health assistance to the rural population?

It is something common that the inhabitants from rural areas must move to other bordering municipalities in order to receive the health assistance they need, especially in which refers to non-urgent medical attention. In front of this paradigm, those people who do not own a private vehicle and/or who live in areas with important scarcities in public transportation services suffer severe deprivations when having access to the health assistance that they need.

This fact is especially relevant among the elderly, a social group which frequently need a continuous health tracking and that most of the times cannot drive. Although nowadays there are already some teleassistance services, they are mainly focused on urgent cases and they do not include non-urgent health assistance servides.

The aim of this call relies on the need of developing an innovative solution able to offer non-urgent and from distance health assistance to the rural population.

Call 4: Rural replacement, new and old opportunities

How can we ensure the generational replacement in rural environments?

The depopulation of rural areas, the chronic rural exodus of many young people from the villages to the cities and the consequent population aging in these areas have become, for years, a serious problem that affects in a direct and indirect manner many socioeconomic areas of these small municipalities (business activity, housing, provision of services to the citizens, etc.)

The aim of this call is to develop an innovative solution able to jointly tackle different of these socioeconomic problems which are derived from the lack of generational replacement in the rural areas of Catalonia.

Call 5: Qualified talent in rural areas

How can we attract more qualified workers to rural businesses?

Many rural companies struggle when searching and attracting human talent to their organizations. This hardship in which respect to the attraction of qualified profiles is one of the biggest concerns among the employees of these areas.

The purpose of this call is to develop an innovative solution able to connect rural companies with qualified professionals.

What should I submit to participate?

To participate you must present a file in ppt or pdf format (about 10 slides), in which the proposal is clearly stated (technical aspects, usability, implementation, etc.) and where it is carefully described how this proposal responds to the call the participant has been worked on.

Optionally, participants may add other value points they consider appropriate for the jury evaluation (for example, a link to a video presentation or a brief summary of the business plan).

It should be remembered that the elements that are most valued in this competition are: degree of viability (it is advisable that the proposal contains elements that show the tangibility of the idea, for example a pilot), degree of innovation (creativity and originality). and degree of adaptability to the call (it is imperative that the document details how the call was approached in a personalized manner).

For further information please visit the rules of the contest.

Want to know more about the calls? See this presentation.