Landscape Connections
The scheme is part of our long-term Landscape Connections initiative, focusing on a series of farm clusters in each of the four river catchments in the North Pennines National Landscape – Eden, Tees, Tyne and Wear.
The programme will be led by the National Landscape team, working in partnership with RSPB, the Farmer Network, and Eden, Wear and Tyne Rivers Trusts, with Natural England taking an advisory role.
Our development grant will allow the team to shape plans ahead of a potential delivery grant to build a more nature-rich, biodiverse landscape. In the long term this involves 250 farmers taking part in a programme to expand nature friendly farming and improving and restoring over 21,000 hectares of land for wildlife to thrive.
The project will also:
- trial data collection techniques and develop a network of citizen scientists
- run a small grants fund to support community organisations and farmers to facilitate visits
- employ engagement officers and farm advisers to target new audiences and work with the farm clusters
Chris Woodley-Stewart, Director of the North Pennines National Landscape partnership, said: “Working collectively with groups of farmers, we’re not only increasing the landscape-scale impact of high nature-value farming, we’re also pooling skills and experience to develop a stronger and more resilient farming sector. Farmers are faced with a bewildering range of advice and approaches – we want to help streamline that to work better for both farming and nature.”
Find out more about our Landscape Connections initiative, or discover other projects we’re supporting across the North.
