Western Daily Press (Saturday)
Praise overdue for country’s true wildlife heroes
THE countryside serves many purposes. But increasing disagreements over those that are most important have turned parts of rural Britain into a battleground. And high profile campaigners, with access to an audience and the skillful use of social media, have been able to generate significant support for their views about the right way to manage the countryside,which can often exclude or marginalise the very people who actually live and work on the land day in and day out.
You don’t have to look very far to see many people, in farming, gamekeeping, rural estate management, forestry and other rural pursuits, now kicking back against what they see as armchair conservationists whose experience of looking after the land are confined to drawing up petitions or putting angry messages onto Facebook and Twitter.
Now one of the organisations that represents the people deeply involved in the day-to-day management of the landscape, are hoping to balance up the equation, fund-raising for a new campaign that seeks to give the credit for bringing conservation and other benefits to the landscape where it is due.
The Game and Wildlife Conservation Trust (GWCT) is pro-country sports and farming. It is also widely respected for its scientific work, carried out on behalf on land owners and managers, to demonstrate the on-the-ground efforts that work for the benefit of wildlife, landscape and, crucially, people. Starting with the question: “Who is responsible for our wildlife” the GWCT hopes to tell what it believes is a largely untold story about the heroes and heroines of rural management.
The national conservation charity, which is based in Fordingbridge, in Hampshire, is writing ‘ The Untold Story’ – a fresh look at how Britain’s landscape is managed for wildlife.
The charity says: “With almost 80 per cent of land in the UK managed for farming or other pursuits, GWCT aims to show the role farmers, gamekeepers and land managers have as custodians of the landscape. These areas are home to some remarkable and rare wildlife, often due to the tireless work of those responsible for their own small corner of the countryside.”
And it’s director of communications Andrew Gilruth, who is launching the campaign, believes an initiative to reverse some of the negative images often promoted by opponents of farming and country sports is long overdue. “It’s time the public got to hear about those who are making the countryside thrive,” he said. “As well as producing the food for our tables, they’re making sure there are curlew in the sky, harvest mice in our fields and water voles in our rivers. The public don’t know how much our wildlife depend on the dedication of individuals managing their own land, so it’s time we vvdid something about it.”
He said the people engaged in the countryside see the impact of management with their own eyes, but it rarely goes wider than that. It is highlighting individuals and their work in the countyside to change that.
“People like Graham Denny who, while turtle doves face extinction elsewhere, has several breeding pairs on his farm thanks to a combination of wildlife-friendly farming and predation management,” added Andrew.
“He is making a real difference and his story deserves to be heard. There are hundreds of men and women across Britain doing what they can for the species they love – be it tree sparrows, great crested newts, bees or curlew. These hardworking people are the blueprint for British conservation.”
Earlier this year, the GWCT launched its first series of Working Conservationists – a booklet of nine case studies - written by former Shooting Times editor Joe Dimbleby - about real people achieving real results on their own land. Environment Secretary Michael Gove said that it “provides a vision of a country of which we can all be proud”. It encouraged the Defra policy team to get out on the ground and see what’s being done for grey partridges, a bird in continuous decline.
With a new Agriculture Bill around the corner, the spotlight is falling on the ‘public goods’ farmers provide and for which, in future, they will be judged against and rewarded for.
The new Environmental Land Management system promises to link subsidy to environmental benefits such as enhanced biodiversity, recognising the value of the wildlife on our farmland and the vital role land managers have in preserving it. The GWCT hopes to give recognition to the people who make that happen.
For more - and to donate - visit www.gwct.org.uk/untoldstory