WWF Land of Plenty: The importance of nature restoration

A recent poll carried out by three of the UK's largest environmental NGOs, the National Trust, the RSPB, and the WWF, found that 81% of UK adults believe that nature is under threat and requires urgent action to protect and restore it (WWF, September 2022). This comes at a time when recent government announcements have come under scrutiny for appearing to reverse important environmental commitments.

This has led HVM to look back at the public dialogue we ran with Resources for Change in 2021 commissioned by WWF. Its purpose was to create a national conversation on land use. The findings from the dialogue (Land of Plenty, March 2022) provide further evidence of the importance to people of nature restoration. Especially in relation to the triple challenge of meeting society's food needs, while tackling the climate crisis and reversing the loss of nature. These are summarised in the visual minutes below:

Visual minutes of findings from across the UK. All the visual minutes are available here.

A Holistic Approach

In line with the findings of the poll, our dialogue participants, recruited from across the UK, call for urgent change. They fear that any complacency or lack of action will cause nature to be depleted to an extent where solutions become impossible. Our participants also want the process of change to include some key processes including:

  • A more holistic approach to land use which combines the efforts of all stakeholders, from government to food producers.

  • Engaging citizens, both formally and informally, across the country in land use, nature restoration and food system decisions.

    As one participant, echoing the views of many made clear:

“I think there needs to be more consultation with the public, and not leave decision-making in closed rooms with landowners and councils and government. I think it should be a very inclusive process, and it’s currently not. Our councils don’t really tell us what their priorities are in terms of these issues. They don’t communicate policy to us, really. I think we’re just left on the margins and powerless, and I’d like to see that change.” – Participant, Hull region

Sorting our priorities

There is also a consensus that mitigating climate change should be the priority as it is seen as the largest threat to nature and the environment. Land use should therefore put nature first and participants welcomed nature restoration programmes as a means of doing this. However, any changes would need to be coordinated with the food production community as participants did not want to see these shifts being a cause of stigma for farmers and farming.

“[This has to be done] with the cooperation and support for and from farmers. They are the custodians of the large open spaces of land in our area and in a lot of the country nationally. Therefore, if we’re going to make real and sustainable change it has to be done through our use of farming.” – Participant, National Summit

As was summed up in a joint statement released by the National Trust, the WWF and the RSPB:

“The desire to defend nature unites people in every community… and we must all be part of the conversation about how we protect and restore it” - Guardian, 30 September 2022

Louis Mylne