Shaping a future for our countryside

What is the countryside for?

This was the question posed to those who attended the Future Countryside event.

The countryside is also a place of inequality, poverty, constrained opportunities, and a lack of basic services. It is a place that has been taken from and degraded by the demands we have placed upon it for food production, and by ill-considered development. The communities, land, water, flora, and fauna have suffered from this, and the contribution to the health of people and the planet has been greatly diminished.

A space once so diverse and active, has become increasingly separated from the daily experience of an increasingly urban society. However, it is a great opportunity, with the potential to make a material contribution to global issues such as climate change, nature recovery, food and energy security, public health, and prosperity.

Redressing the balance

At Future Countryside, we heard that despite this depletion, our countryside retains an extraordinary power to heal our society and our planet.

We also heard that for this potential to be realised, it requires change. Change in how food, fibre, and timber are produced, how our soils, peatlands, and water are treated, how habitats are protected and created, how rural communities are served, how enterprise is enabled, how access to the countryside is provided for all, how nature is cherished and restored, and how capital and investment is distributed.

But if we are to ask more of the countryside as a vital part of addressing some of our biggest challenges, we need to make sure those able to deliver those benefits are enabled to do so.

We need to move to a place of consensus on the priorities and recognise that to equip our rural places and to respond to these demands, we need to address the issues that undermine the vitality of rural communities. Limited access to affordable housing, services, transport, and employment opportunities lead to many reluctantly, turning their back on rural life.

To address this requires a step change in public policy, in the expectations and received thinking of many, and in the willingness of groups and organisations with a specific mission to think holistically. The question is what should this step change comprise of, how can it be achieved, and who needs to do what?

Call to action

Future Countryside’s aim is to be the start of the conversation, with a tangible outcome. Heather Hancock, Non-Executive Director at Rural Solutions, Chair of The Royal Countryside Fund and Defra’s lead non-executive board member was asked to act as event rapporteur - to respond to the discussion and consider the challenge to define and deliver a shared rural vision.

Rural Solutions were privileged to participate in the conversation and have been supporting the creation of the call to action which will be published in the autumn. More details can be found on the Future Countryside website here.