The Welsh Assembly Government has revealed plans to place Welsh culture, rugby clubs and industrial heritage at the heart of the sustainable regeneration of communities across the country.

Speaking at a conference on Culture, the Creative Industries and Regeneration, Welsh deputy minister for regeneration Leighton Andrews announced details of a number of regeneration projects that will be centred around Welsh heritage and culture, as well as the 2010 Valleys Homecoming initiative. Projects include the Rugby Community Development project, which will involve the Welsh Rugby Union and the Heads of the Valleys programme working in partnership to provide upgraded rugby facilities to encourage greater community use.

Other schemes will include heritage regeneration, with plans to create a multi-million pound national capital programme to revamp specific heritage sites and buildings in partnership with the Assembly Government's historic environment agency, Cadw. Additional funding has also been earmarked for the National Library of Wales to digitise historic newspapers published in the South Wales Valleys, while the role of the Welsh language will be highlighted through the work of the Welsh Language Board.

Andrews said: "The sustainability of the Welsh language depends not only on increasing the number of Welsh speakers overall but also on sustaining high densities of Welsh language speakers in communities which reproduce a Welsh speaking culture."