A PARTY of Russians has come to Swindon to study environmental projects.

The group travelled from the city of Omsk in their country's industrial heartland.

Decades of heavy industrial work, with pollution largely unchecked during the period when Russia was part of the former Soviet Union, has had a heavy impact on the local environment.

The party spent much of their time in Swindon talking to members of the Swindon Council-backed Local Agenda 21 organisation.

Agenda 21 is a world-wide movement whose remit is to devise ways in which economies can prosper while having as little impact as possible on ecosystems.

As well as learning about current projects and policies, the Russians took time out to visit the Steam museum at Churchward.

There, they learned about the town's crucial role in the formative years of the railway industry, and how locomotives built in Swindon were exported throughout most of the world.