The UK’s geographic identity is deeply tied to its islands, with a coastline stretching over 31,368 km and an archipelago of more than 6,000 islands. Around 210 of these are inhabited, predominantly in Scotland—offering unique cultural, economic, and environmental landscapes. Despite their stunning beauty and historical importance, island resilience is facing significant challenges including budgetary constraints, workforce shortages, housing crises, and geographical isolation.
Recognising the importance of understanding rural and island life, the Social Value Engine recently hosted a webinar featuring expert speakers deeply embedded in Scotland’s island communities. This event highlighted how social value approaches can play a critical role in building sustainable investment frameworks related to the nuanced needs of island life.
Following an introduction by SVE founder Ivan Annibal and Marketing Director Maddie Kortenaar, the webinar featured Anna Whelan based in Shetland, Luke Fraser from the North Ronaldsay Trust in Orkney, and Fañch Bihan-Gallic—a park ranger at the North Harris Trust. Together, they brought invaluable perspectives on employing social value tools to address island communities’ distinct challenges and opportunities.
1. Context and location matters
Based on Social Value International’s eight key principles, our approach emphasises the role of grounding assessments in context-specific realities. Therefore, it is critical to acknowledge that each island possesses distinct characteristics, which demand tailored approaches to investment and policymaking. In this regard, the webinar experts underscored that while challenges like housing shortages or infrastructure gaps are common across the UK, they manifest uniquely in island settings.
Notably, Anna Whelan illustrated this diversity through maps and historical context, emphasising how the geographical positioning of Orkney and Shetland influences their socio-economic realities. The Island Communities Impact Assessment (ICIA), introduced under the Islands (Scotland) Act, ensures that policies account for the unique dynamics of each island. For example, a single house in North Ronaldsay, a remote island with just 65 inhabitants, has a vastly different social impact compared to one on the Orkney Mainland. Such nuances highlight the critical need for tools like the Social Value Engine, which can translate these lived experiences into measurable social impacts to strengthen their overall sustainability.
2. Placing “Dùthchas” at the centre
Dùthchas, a Gaelic term, reflects the bond between communities and their environment—a true cornerstone of sustainable island development. According to the Shielding Project, dùthchas epitomises the Gaelic worldview by describing the “tangible conduct and action motivated by a sense of ethics, respect, and responsibility for said place and community to maintain ecological balance.”
As park ranger Fañch Bihan-Gallic explained, this concept serves as a guiding philosophy driving the work of numerous organisations in the Highlands and Islands, including the North Harris Trust. By effectively treating the environment as both a community asset and a cultural legacy, it intertwines local practices—such as crofting and peat cutting—with ecological stewardship. Therefore, this approach highlights the importance of language and historical awareness in fostering community resilience and resonating with global efforts to elevate indigenous land management practices.
3. Small developments have big impacts
In island communities, even modest developments can result in transformative outcomes. For example, Luke Fraser shared how redeveloping a single schoolhouse in North Ronaldsay encouraged families to remain on the island, preserving the local school and attracting skilled workers. Similarly, the £2 million Treb Community Hub project integrates a wool mill, housing, wellbeing facilities, and community transport into a multi-functional space. While these projects may seem small on a national scale, their impact on island life is deeply profound. It also demonstrates how creative funding approaches can support initiatives that boost resilience and self-sufficiency in rural areas.
Luke underscored the importance of social value assessments in successfully securing investments for project developments on the island: “The reason we really got much into the Social Value Engine was to try and work at this micro-scale, to see how we can show the value that a lot of these projects bring. With some of the projects, it’s difficult to argue them on a value-from-money scale just because of the number of people we’re talking about and the money that is required to develop some of these projects. It’s quite difficult to argue them at that scale, but a social value scale is so much easier – the impact is so much larger.”
4. Challenges in capturing social value
Despite its many benefits, the webinar experts also reflected that assessing social value in island contexts can present various hurdles. Crucially, they highlighted the challenges of applying standardised metrics in island contexts, which underscores current gaps in existing proxies. For instance, traditional proxies for housing projects might focus on urban metrics, including reducing rough sleeping, which are less relevant in island communities where housing shortages affect sustainability and family retention.
Therefore, developing more nuanced proxies through innovative methods, such as subjective wellbeing assessments, could allow the Social Value Engine to capture the unique social benefits of projects on a smaller scale. As the social value journey is an ongoing process, collaborations with academia and further research are essential to refining tools and metrics that align with the lived realities of islanders.
Overall, our webinar shed light on the fact that the concept of resilience goes far beyond infrastructure to encompass community wellbeing, economic sustainability, and cultural preservation. Projects rooted in local traditions—such as North Ronaldsay’s unique sheep breed, valued for its wool—combine identity with economic benefit, showcasing how heritage can drive development.
We would like to use this opportunity to thank the speakers for their key contributions to support Scotland’s island communities. Throughout the event, they effectively illustrated the potential of tools, including the Social Value Engine, in empowering communities to articulate their unique challenges and opportunities, thereby bridging gaps between local realities and wider funding or policy frameworks.
For more insight into how island communities can harness social value for sustainable investment, please watch the full webinar recording on YouTube here:
Lastly, this webinar reaffirmed the importance of placing communities at the heart of decision-making. As the only UK-based accredited solution, the Social Value Engine can provide support in accurately and transparently measuring the social value of your initiatives. To learn more about the Social Value Engine or arrange a demo, please feel welcome to visit our website here: https://socialvalueengine.com/
