The 2011 Commonwealth Local Government Conference: Energising Local Economies: An Overview

In the current economic climate, creating the right environment for local enterprise, inward investment, and business and skills development, is an important factor in ensuring the prosperity and wellbeing of local communities. The impact of the global financial crisis has not been uniform across the Commonwealth and countries are using different strategies to overcome their financial difficulties. Local government increasingly plays an important part in this. More and more local governments in countries across the Commonwealth have responsibilities and powers for local economic development: in some countries local authorities can already show how their policies and actions are helping energise their local economies, while in other countries local councils are just beginning to get to grips with these responsibilities