Presentation to Newtown Town Council July 2015

Points to be made at the presentation:

  • Historical background: The twinning of Newtown and Les Herbiers first began in 1999. Over the years there have been many cultural exchanges such as musical events, school exchanges and food festivals along with sporting activities such as football, cycling and the twinning Olympics. Many personal relationships and friendships have been developed over the years to the benefit of all concerned.  In 2010 both towns celebrated the 10th anniversary of the twinning.
  • What twinning brings to the town: it potentially can cover a vibrant array of areas, for example art & culture, young people, work experience, education, sports, business, sustainable development, citizenship, public services, economic growth, social inclusion etc.
  • Bringing People together: By bringing people together from different countries and cultures, it gives us an opportunity to share problems & solutions, exchange opinions, learn from each other, and create friendships through common interests and issues.
  • Recent and Future direction of the Twinning Committee: A new Twinning committee was formed in 2015 and as a result of our French friends participation in the 2014 Newtown Food Festival they developed the idea of an international food festival in Les Herbiers. As a newly formed committee we supported the Les Herbier international  food festival and decided to promote our local producers at this event by running a commercial activity on their behalf advertising, promoting and selling Montgomeryshire products in Les Herbiers.  The event was very successful commercially and nearly £4000-00 of sales were made by us on their behalf.  This has now given the confidence to local producers to attend other French events and French producers to visit us during our food festival.  In the Future we hope to expand this success to the promotion and sales of local Montgomeryshire crafts at the famous international Chrono event in Les Herbier in 2016.

PDF File of Presentation to Newtown Council-2015

Presentation to Newtown Council-2015