This project clearly demonstrates how individuals within a community can come together to develop effective local and regional solutions to combat global problems, and how university-based centres such as NICRE can support them.
What is novel about this project is the way in which HNZ, and NICRE are working together to develop local solutions that can be scaled to regional, and, eventually, national levels. Importantly, HNZ took the initial lead, identifying challenges in their community and developing solutions. NICRE then provided a small amount of funding to help make these solutions a reality. This is truly bottom-up community development.