Forest's flavors

Local flavors create new experiences

The project ”Flavors of the Forest” aims to elevate the local food culture, small-scale food producers, and taste experiences in Hässleholm and northeastern Skåne. The idea is to gather producers, the tourism industry, and other stakeholders around a common theme that reflects the region's forests, lakes, agricultural landscapes, and cultural history.

Hovdala Castle will become an important hub in the project and, together with others such as Destination Hässleholm, Kristianstad University, Krinova, and the National Property Board, will develop new forms of collaboration. One goal is for larger tourist destinations to function as showrooms for local producers, where visitors can more easily discover, taste, and purchase local products.

Through networking meetings, skills development, study visits, product development, and joint events, new ideas and collaborations will emerge. Themes could include game, berries and mushrooms, fish and crayfish, outdoor cooking, and historical flavors in a modern interpretation.

The goal is, among other things, to create new products and taste experiences, more sales channels, new and developed events, and a long-term collaboration model for local food producers and tourist destinations. The project will also contribute to greater visibility, stronger entrepreneurship, and increased pride in the community. In the long run, the collaboration may also strengthen the area's resilience by allowing stakeholders to share knowledge, resources, and markets.

The board's assessment

Decision date: 2026-08-26
Total selection criteria: 955 points
The board's justification: The board assesses that the project Flavors of the Forest has a strong local anchoring and meets identified needs for increased collaboration, visibility, and development opportunities for local food producers and stakeholders in the tourism industry. The project's broad collaboration between the public, private, and non-profit sectors, as well as academia, is a clear strength and creates good conditions for knowledge exchange, new collaborations, and development. By developing Hovdala Castle as a hub and showroom for local producers, along with networking, product development, and joint events, the project is expected to strengthen both local entrepreneurship and the area's attractiveness. The networks, investments, and forms of collaboration established also have good prospects for continuing after the project period. The project meets the basic conditions and has received 975 points, which exceeds the rejection threshold of 400 points. The board overall assesses that the project contributes well to the goals of the local development strategy and therefore decides to approve the application.