Better incentives needed to regenerate Kilkenny towns and villages - Green Party

Better incentives for people who want to live over shops in the towns and villages of Kilkenny is one of the ways that Green Party leader, Eamon Ryan wants to tackle rural decline.
Visiting Kilkenny on Monday, he also said there was a need to implement the National Planning Framework to address the imbalance in building and development in Dublin compared with the rest of the country.
He noted that while Kilkenny and the south east had over 8% of the national population only 5% of the industry and development was in the south east and he said if elected that he and the Green Party would address the imbalance.
Alive and Vibrant
“I see Kilkenny and in particular, Cartoon Saloon as the template for other urban areas. There are 300 people working with the animation company in the centre of the city and it’s working to keep the core of the city alive and vibrant,” he said.
“This is the kind of thing we have to replicate around Ireland,” he added.
He is very impressed with places like Ballyhale, Windgap and Callan where the self-help attitude is helping to keep these places alive.
He said he regretted his comments on using car pools for small villages and said his comments were taken out of context and that he understood there was no easy solution to keeping small rural villages alive.
New Green Plan
“This is where the EU’s Green Deal for farming comes in. We want to push the EU’s new green plan where Irish farmers will be paid through CAP for producing quality produce, which will in turn help local communities to thrive,” he said.
“The future is sustainable farming and we need to cherish all our food producers and lower the amount of imported food.”