VILLAGE communities are being offered the opportunity to access free one-to-one support for projects as part of a national Village SOS initiative backed by the Big Lottery Fund.

The decision to continue with Village SOS follows on from the success of a similar Lottery-funded campaign, launched in 2009, which saw more than 160 innovative village projects brought to fruition.

Now in its second year, the current £1.4m UK-wide Village SOS campaign has already provided advice and support for more than 150 projects, although none so far in East Hampshire.

A community radio station, a small friendship circle/lunch club that provides a vital social facility for isolated residents, a large-scale multi-functioning community centre which offers a full range of services under one roof, and a heritage project which looks to create new employment locally are among the first projects receiving support.

Any project in a rural community of fewer than 10,000 residents that provides a service could be eligible for support, and they are being encouraged to get in touch to find out more.

Village SOS (Support, Outreach and Sustainability) seeks to make communities more enterprising and help people to reinvent and reinvigorate existing services.

It is supported and promoted by the Action with Communities in Rural England network which has joined forces with the Big Lottery Fund, Rocket Science and Rose Regeneration to support rural projects from the early stages of planning to the point where they are ready to get ideas off the ground.

Help is in the form of Village SOS mentoring, with support from Action Hampshire, a charity that supports not-for-profit organisations to make Hampshire a better place to live, work and invest.

Mentors are available to assist with a range of subjects, including websites, consultations, funding, business plans, marketing, or volunteer management.

Jo Dixon, of Action Hampshire, said: “It’s been a good start nationally and it is great to hear about such a wide variety of projects getting involved with the campaign. I’m certain that projects in Hampshire will benefit from learning from their experiences. Projects can receive support from us now to help them develop and progress their own plan of support, setting out the next steps to help them to become more sustainable.”

Ivan Annibal, of Rose Regeneration, said: “These individuals will work with the local organisation supporting a project and are a network of experts who are able to share their knowledge and expertise for free as part of any Village SOS support plan. They are volunteers who have a range of experience from having been involved with their own community project, or those who have run their own business, or are academics, or accredited social enterprise experts.”