Small and medium towns in South Africa face significant socio-economic, infrastructure, and governance challenges. However, local changemakers across the country are taking action to find solutions and re-activate the potential of their towns.
The Towns Action Network (TAN) is an action-based national learning and support network that connects changemakers and fosters local partnerships across sectors to support the regeneration of South African small towns.
Network activities are designed to inspire joint action to revive small town economies and promote learning and collaborative action between local municipalities, residents, and business.
The network uses storytelling to spotlight ‘what is strong instead of what is wrong’ and showcase the potential for sustainable impact and change.
Sign up for the TAN newsletter here.
Connect
Connecting changemakers around small-town regeneration
Communicate
Sharing stories of changemakers who are turning around the fate of their towns
Collaborate
Enabling residents, policymakers, researchers, support organisations & storytellers to partner effectively
TAN Partners
The Towns Action Network is convened by the EDP and supported by seven organisations leading the regeneration of small towns in South Africa, with funding from the Finnish Fund for Local Cooperation.
Storytelling for social change: learning from practitioners
Towns Action Network partners share how their organisations use storytelling to change practice.
Towns Action Network: August 2023 Gathering
Join the August gathering of the Towns Action Network – which will focus on empowering active citizens in regenerating South Africa’s small towns.
Towns Action Network Announces Funding Partnership with Embassy of Finland
The Towns Action Network announces a new funding partnership with the Embassy of Finland, as the national learning and support platform expands its partnering reach for town regeneration in South Africa.
Want to join TAN?
The Towns Action Network is open to any organisation or individual involved in small town regeneration and governance in South Africa. This includes residents and businesses, municipal officials, civil society, community organisations, researchers, media and other changemakers.
We encourage active participation in this voluntary network to foster sustainable change and impact.
Network benefits include:
- Quarterly online gatherings, with post-event recordings, reports and resources shared.
- Updates and opportunities to get involved in local partnership projects.
- Insights and advice from TAN Support Partners.
- A regular newsletter including network highlights, features, updates and more.
For more information, contact: Nobungcwele Mbem, EDP Project Lead, nobungcwele@wcedp.co.za
Towns of change
See where TAN members are active across South Africa.
Find the geographical locations and descriptions of small-town changemaking initiatives on this interactive map.
Resources
TAN Gatherings
Quarterly gatherings bring the full network together to share learnings and best practices.
Previous Gatherings:
December Gathering (1 December 2022)
Session recording | Report
September Gathering (21 September 2022)
Session recording | Report
May Gathering (19 May 2022)
Session recording | Report
Launch of TAN (2 March 2022)
Session recording | Report
Support resources
TAN Offers and Needs Catalogue: Interactive form providing opportunities for TAN members around partnership building, vertical and horizontal learning exchange and skills transfer.
TAN page on uKESA: An easily accessible online repository that shares information and networking opportunities relating to the built environment. The TAN page contains media articles, research papers and speeches related to small towns and local government.