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The Committee received and considered the Project Managers report which advised Members that the council was one of 16 Go Trade partners from areas across Southern England and northern France and would work across several project streams including tourism, communications and digital development.
The project: 'GO TRADE' stands for Growth of the Visitor Economy through Traditional Markets, Employment and Skills and aims to increase visitor footfall across a number of town centres throughout the partnership geography, by enhancing the visitor experience of traditional street markets. The specific objective of the project is to “improve and modernise the traditional markets offer to use them as entry point for tourism and to create a cross-border brand targeting visitors from close Europe”
It was reported that building relationships between partner organisations and planning work began in late 2017 with the project concluding administratively in 2022. Project delivery must be completed by 31 December 2021.
The report provided Members with an update of the progress and outcomes of the Go Trade project to date, along with detailing the plans for the remainder of the project and legacy.
Members were advised that the Council had accumulated £53,441 of unmatched GO Trade funding, whereupon Interreg awarded full intervention rate for three claims resulting in the Council’s 31% match being retained. As the agreed funding match should be used for market initiatives, officers propose to reinvest into Great Yarmouth Borough in the following ways:
- Roaming Farmer/Produce Markets
A mandatory deliverable is to attract new markets to join the Go Trade brand. It can be achieved by establishing new regular markets (farmers, produce and craft markets) in addition to the town centre permanent market. In conjunction with another emerging initiative within the area of Gorleston, local organisations could apply for up to £500 utilising the above funds for set up costs for branded equipment, to deliver such pop-up markets.
The initiative would include attracting local sellers and traders who can also find an opportunity to join the Town Centre market if they wish. If Members were minded to support this approach, a small grant application would be reviewed by a panel consisting of representatives from Property Services (Market Management), Environmental Health (licensing); Business Support and Project Management Office (responsible for Go Trade project delivery). To comply with Go Trade branding requirements the roaming markets would be registered through the Go Trade Quality Assurance Committee (QAC).
These markets would benefit from being added to the Go Trade website; promoted across partner social media channels, tourism channels and featured within the ongoing tourism itineraries. Their Traders would have access to the business training modules built into the member section of the Go Trade platform, for free.
The remaining balance of the additional income would be utilised to cover the annual cost of the Marketplace Wi-Fi for 2022/23 until the maintenance costs absorbed by Property Services.
Finally, the balance utilised by the Events Team to deliver an event celebrating the reopening of the new market post redevelopment and investment towards future Food and Drink festivals held on the marketplace.
It was advised that these initiatives would not be of any disadvantage to current market traders.
Councillor T Wright sort clarification of the outstanding funding and it was advised this was unspent funding not additional funds. Councillor Wright further commented that he would have liked to have seen some of the funding spent on the promoting of events in the Market Place including the opening of the new market place.
RESOLVED :
That the Committee :-
(1) Note the achievements of Go Trade project as described in the report.
(2) Agree to Investigate the opportunity of using some of the GYBC unspent allocation to set up a small grant scheme to establish a new roaming farmers market.
(3) Approve the allocation of the remainder of the funding to Wi-Fi maintenance and market opening launch.