Regional Economic Development (RED) Grants – Round Two now Open
The RED Grants program is a State Government initiative that invests in community driven projects to create jobs and boost economic growth across regional Western Australia. The State Government's Royalties for Regions program will invest $28.8 million towards the RED Grants program over five years for projects that will directly benefit regional communities. 

Each of the Regional Development Commissions (RDC) manage the grant round process for their region, and will provide advice to applicants during the application process. Eligible applicants can apply for RED Grant funding of up to $250,000 for individual projects that promote sustainable jobs, partnerships, productivity, skills and capability, as well as stimulate new investment in industry diversification.

Round one investment totalled $6.38 million in 70 projects for initiatives across the nine regions.

The objectives of the RED Grants Program include:

• Sustainable jobs growth;
• Increasing productivity;
• Expanding or diversifying industry;
• Developing skills or capabilities; and
• Attracting new investment in the region;

We think that this grant program represents an excellent opportunity for many of our members – particularly with a focus on developing skills and capabilities. We are currently working with a few of our members in regard to what types of programs they could deliver and how they would go about making a submission. Please get in touch with me at ceo@regionalchamberswa.com.au if we can help your Chamber with this. To find out more about the Grants read here.

nbn Quarterly Business Briefing for RCCIWA Members
On Tuesday we held another quarterly Business Briefing with Jane McNamara from nbn which was a great opportunity to receive an update from nbn and also for our members to ask questions on behalf of their members. We really appreciate nbn offering this for our members and thank those who dialled in for making the time.

Jane updated us on:

• The new nbn business solutions finder tool business nbn™ solution finder
• Business satellite product
• Sky Muster plus product
• Nbn and chamber business information sessions

Detailed follow up information will be sent to you next week.

RCCIWA Member Portal on Website
We are pleased to let you know that the resource portal had been built on our website. This is a member’s access area that will be a resource library with documents on all areas relevant to our members, from our members. We are currently working on filling the portal and hope to have it live by the end of this month. You access codes will be emailed to you once it is ready to go.

RCCIWA Members Forum – October 31^st and November 1^st 2019
Planning is underway for the second RCCIWA Members Forum for 2019 – which will be held on October 31^st and November 1^st in Perth. We encourage you to get in touch and let us know the speakers and topics you would like to see included, to ensure we continue to provide a relevant and valuable experience. Please email me at ceo@regionalchamberswa.com.au with any suggestions you may have.

Town Teams WA Conference – September 13 and 14 2019
The Town Team Movement is an ‘under-arching’, non-profit organisation helping to create a network of town teams around Australia and New Zealand. They promote civic leadership, active citizenship and community empowerment. Town teams are positive and proactive organisations that include businesses, landowners and residents working collaboratively with their local government to improve a place or area, often a town centre or ‘main street’. We heard from Town Teams at our June Members Forum and many of our members expressed interested in attending their conference in September – the program sounds amazing. For more info go here.

Wheatbelt Provider Appointed to Collect Data on the Governments new Container Deposit Scheme
The Western Australian Treasurer, the Hon Ben Wyatt MLA, has asked the Economic Regulation Authority to monitor and report on the prices of beverages affected by the container deposit scheme, which is due to begin operation in June 2020.

The ERA has appointed the Goomalling Community Resource Centre to coordinate collection of data in regional and remote Western Australia. Its contracted personnel will shortly commence collecting data from retailers. Read more by viewing the notice on the ERA website.

APPLY FOR SME SURGE | FOOD VALUE ADD SERIES – Applications Close August 8th
SME Surge | Food Value Add is a tailored 8-week program to help SME owners and senior leadership team in the Food Value Add sector.

Whether a grower, processor, freight & logistics, wholesaler or retailer, domestically or export focused - this program will help transform your business to get scale, create and capture new value in your business and position it to be harvestable for returns, and is critical if you need development and/or growth capital!

Delivered by experienced practitioners in innovation, commercialisation and investment in creating and operating high growth businesses as well as specialists in the agri, food and investment sectors.

SME Surge will help identify new areas of opportunity, provide guidance on how to craft investable business structures to transform your business with access, as part of the program, to experienced mentors and networks. To find out more go to their website.