Foula benefits from additional funding given to island projects

Sunset over Foula. 

A knitwear company from Foula has benefited from a major share of Scottish government funding.

Foula Wool has received two funding instalments totalling over £146,000 through the Island Communities Fund.

The fund provides investment for community-led projects which support employment and community resilience.

It also aims to help in the transition to net-zero.

Foula Wool’s Magnus Holbourn said: “This is a genuine transformational opportunity for our island business.

“We have worked extremely hard over a number of years building up a customer base and establishing our Foula Wool product range.

“To now be able to bring all of the physical processing work that goes into creating the product back to the island, retaining its full value in the local economy is simply a dream come true.

“The fact that all of the yarn processing machines will be running on low carbon renewable electricity generated by Foula’s own off-grid network not only increases overall island resilience but also allows us to significantly lower our business carbon footprint.

“We are really passionate about the environment and it makes us so happy to know that we are going to be able to produce our product in a responsible way, supporting our community and our unique sheep at the same time.”

The Fund is managed by Inspiring Scotland on behalf of the Scottish government and the 35 successful projects span across 55 islands.