Razvojna agencija Sotla

RA Sotla

Development agency Sotla is an institution that performs public services for a 5 of municipalities in the South-eastern part of Slovenia (by the Croatian border).
The Agency represents a bridge between all regional municipalities and the European Union regions. Main work areas for Development Agency Sotla: rural development, development of small and medium enterprises, tourism development, working with youth, preservation of natural and cultural heritage, preservation of the environment and human resources. We are also manager of Local Action Group for rural development (2014-2020). Local Action Groups (LAGs) are made up of public and private partners from the rural territory and include representatives from different socio-economic sectors. The European Union Regulation for the local management of rural development programmes provides them.
Primary aim of the company is to promote the local development process with the active participation of private, public sector, and civil society of the area as well. In the field of regional development, RA Sotla is one of the partner of the joint Networking Development Network in Savinjska region, which is officially registered at the Ministry of Economic Development and Technology.

SPOT Registration – electronic processes with the help of consultants, which is the second level of the SPOT system are the physical »registration« points for supporting business entities. On these points, the user can perform procedures on the SPOT portal with the help of a consultant. In addition, on SPOT Consulting – Business consulting and regional
integration. That is the third level of the SPOT system represents 12 regional (on for each statistical region) consulting points. Their purpose is to provide expert assistance in various fields such as counselling, workshops organization, training, exchange of good practices, regional integration, co-creation of a supportive environment for business subjects, etc. What the third level of the SPOT systems offers is a significantly wider range of services that help potential/future entrepreneurs to raise market competitiveness.
The RA Sotla is experienced in planning and implementing European and Nati

 

onal Developing Programs, as it has taken part in a large number of implementations of European Programs.
The inhabitants (mostly rural) of Obsotelje and Kozjansko represent the most important development potential of our region. Human-resource development and the increasing quality of knowledge capital are key factors in improving the competitiveness of the region. This is also one of the main priorities of the RA Sotla where we, together with our business partners, carry out development projects in the fields of developing the local labor market, improving the competitiveness of the economy and employed persons, increasing the employability as well as strengthening the supporting environment.
Sustainable tourism plays an important role to promote, preserve and enjoy heritage in Obsotelje and Kozjansko region (www.visitok.eu), interrelating three components: cultural heritage, tourism and creative industry, which sometimes are difficult to balance considering that tourism has been a powerful economic sector while wealth heritage is a nonrenewable resource that cannot be considered a traditional consumer product and creative industries are not developed as well as desired in the culture sector yet.
We are closely connected with the development of tourism in the cross border areas and are aware with the need of cultural tourism push (www.inculturaveritas.eu), based on the available studies and resources. P

 

articipation of partner`s team in previous projects, related to development 

 

of tourism in cross border area, contributed for acquiring experience and skills

 

, which can help resolving problem of low rate of creative culture offer as а part of process of tourism development.
Our experiences in the field of tourism development projects will contribute to the Consortium in to aspects: one is the collaboration of different stakeholders and communication with partners in the region and they 

RA Sotla is within the framework of state support services for business entities, part of a new national service called SPOT, which was launched in spring 2018. With that, the former VEM offices were renamed in SPOT offices (hereinafter SPOT (VEM) offices). The SPOT system – the Slovenian Business Point combines four levels – RA Sotla works in two levels:

expertise in heritage preservation and promotion of a region. Number of paid staff of the RA Sotla: 5.

 

Contact Person: Anita Čebular e-mail: anita.sotla@siol.net