It’s been one year since the launch of Save our Wild Isles, a first-time partnership between the RSPB, WWF-UK and the National Trust. To celebrate the anniversary, we’re taking you to visit four projects around the UK where people are making an impact in their community.
Nature is our life support system. But it’s under threat. Save our Wild Isles is an urgent call to action for all of us. It opened the UK’s largest ever conversation about the future of nature and was a first-time partnership between the RSPB, the National Trust and WWF-UK.
Save our Wild Isles asks us all to take action for nature at home, at work, at school and in our community. To mark one year of the partnership, we’re introducing you to a handful of community heroes who are making a difference – some who gained support through the Save Our Wild Isles Community Fund in partnership with Aviva, the RSPB and WWF-UK.
Knockbreda Community Garden, cared for by volunteers, provides respite for wildlife and people alike in the busy and bustling inner-city Belfast. It’s described as a place to meet friends and make new ones, with the aim of tackling loneliness in the city.
Along with growing organic food for the community, the Knockbreda Community Garden is boosting Belfast’s biodiversity. From log piles to beehives, the volunteers are allowing nature to move in. With the help of the Save Our Wild Isles Community Fund, and their 52 supporters, the team have installed a pond and an orchard, adding invaluable habitat in their garden. The funding has also enabled them to create an outdoor energy efficient gardening facility for the volunteers to produce organic food and fruit.
The team hope that the garden will inspire its visitors to take big ideas for nature back home with them, no matter the size of their outdoor space, creating a network of habitat hotspots around the city.
In Alex’s teenage years, he was offered a job which would change his life forever; he began working for a friend as a gardener. Alexander Thompson-Byer grew up in South London, and as a young, black man, faced many microaggressions. He had unknowingly grown up feeling disconnected from nature, but his new job ignited a love for being outdoors.
In the period of working for his friend, Alex realised he had found his vocation. He set up his own business as a gardener, and here, he stumbled upon the practice of permaculture. Alex relocated to the Outer Hebrides with his son. He bought a 10-acre croft, where he his practising a permaculture approach to managing his patch. He has worked with the RSPB’s local Warden, Claire Bird, who advises the local community and crofters to manage their land to benefit the local wildlife.
BS13 is one of the most deprived postcodes in Bristol. Despite living on the edge of one of the UK’s wealthiest cities, life in the area is hard. BS13 Young Green Influencers is a social action group, set up to allow young people to engage with nature, and help them to campaign for a cleaner, greener future within their community. While Bristol is known for activism and protest, the community in the BS13 postcode is unlikely to be involved, and so the group is aiming to diversify the environmental conversation.
Through arts and crafts, the BS13 Young Green Influencers have been exploring the importance of growing plants for pollinators. With £10,063 raised from 79 supporters with the help of the Save Our Wild Isles Community Fund, they are now raising awareness within their local community on the importance of nature. They’re also lobbying local supermarkets, introducing gentle protest and developing strategies to clear up their green space.
Stump Up For Trees have an ambitious plan: they’re going to plant one million trees in the Brecon Beacons. And they’ve got plenty of people on board to help them.
Founded by the local community, the project was started when neighbouring farmers decided they’d like to plant more trees on their own land. And once they got going, they didn’t want to stop! Their plan is to create a diverse, native habitat to help combat the UK’s biodiversity crisis. They have successfully managed to get many of the farmers in the local community involved. Planting trees boosts the wildlife on their farms and provides shelter for their own livestock. These farmers are giving back to the land that helps them to provide and ensuring it will be able to continue to provide in years to come.
Stump Up For Trees raised £10,755 from 63 supporters with the help of the Save Our Wild Isles Fund. The funding supported the group primarily in making their nursery more accessible to volunteers, and to help with water management on site.
The Save Our Wild Isles Community Fund was launched in March 2023, to make it easier for local communities across the UK to take action for nature. Community projects which aimed to boost biodiversity and promote nature connectedness among people were able to apply for the fund. Each project raised money from their supporters, which Aviva then matched 2:1.
Communities play a crucial part in helping restore nature on our doorstep. A remarkable 250 groups from across the UK collectively raised an incredible £2.5 million to help bring nature back to life.
Of those who took part in the Community Fund, over 90% felt they made a difference to nature in their local area, 82% felt more involved in their local community and an incredible 97% feel their work will continue.
The People’s Plan for Nature showed the importance of community in tackling the biodiversity crisis and Save our Wild Isles demonstrates the wealth of nature we have right on our doorstep that needs our help. So, what action can you take next?
Visit our Nature on Your Doorstep hub, where you can find top tips from our expert gardening team to invite nature into your outdoor space. You can also find advice on how to engage your local authority and get started on a community green space. If you’d like the handy hints to land directly in your inbox then make sure to sign up for the email list. We’d love to have you on board!
