THE VILLAGE THAT BOUNCED BACK

Europe’s villages are in rapid decline, but one man’s example shows there’s a way to halt rural decay

- Tim Hulse

THE FIRST THING you notice is the buzzing. As you wander the lanes of Saint-Pierre-de-Frugie, there’s a constant background hum as bees feast on the nectar of the many lavender plants and other perennials in its well-kept roadside flowerbeds. But it’s not just bees that are attracted to this tiny village that nestles in the rolling hills of Dordogne, central France. Tourists come to walk the surrounding hiking trails. And as the building work currently being carried out on some of its properties attests, others are increasingly coming here to set down roots.

This seeming rural idyll is the work of one man, Gilbert Chabaud, a retired car salesman who has seemingly found an answer to the scourge of depopulation that continues to afflict Europe’s rural areas. A sprightly 75-yearold, Chabaud was born in the neighbouring village and has witnessed first-hand a slow exodus. In 2008 he was elected mayor of the local area.

“I didn’t want to be mayor,” he says, as he sits enjoying a carrot quiche in Saveurs et Valeurs, the village’s thriving restaurant. “I’d never thought about it, but friends persuaded me to put myself forward.”

To his surprise, he was elected, and now receives a less-than-princely salary of 600 euros a month. But the money isn’t important to Chabaud. He’s a man on a mission: to breathe new life into the place he loves.

“When I was elected, there were no businesses, no restaurants, no school,” he says, with a typical Gaelic shrug. “The question was: what could I do to stop the village dying and to make people come here and stay?”