The role of nature recovery in driving economic growth is the new corporate strategy from Natural England.
Healthy nature is the foundation of a strong and productive economy. The strategy, Recovering Nature for Growth, Health and Security, reflects Natural England’s ambition to build more diverse partnerships and enhance collaboration with different sectors to realise the opportunities that nature recovery holds for growth.
Investing in nature pays dividends. Healthy ecosystems play a vital role in our national security, economic growth and health and wellbeing. England’s peatlands provide water filtration valued at up to £888m per year. Green spaces provide £25.6bn in welfare value annually through improved mental and physical health.
The new strategy clears a pathway to making nature-based solutions an integral part of how we build and invest for the future. It sets out how Natural England will support business to deliver its ambitions while growing nature. A key part of the strategy is a shift away from site-by-site species-by-species interventions and towards achieving nature recovery at scale across whole landscapes and seascapes.
Tony Juniper, chair of Natural England, said: “Nature provides the foundation stones of our growth, health and security. The threats facing nature today are also threats to our way of life. The scale of the challenge facing us means that we need to increase our ambition for nature recovery and change the way we have worked.
“Succeeding means thinking carefully about where and how to target our efforts so that we can do bigger and better, as well as promote collaboration on nature across society. We can grow the economy and meet the government’s stretching legal environment targets – this strategy sets out a path to do just that.”
Marian Spain, chief executive of Natural England, said: “There is a huge positive opportunity at hand to unlock the power of Nature in pursuit of wider national priorities for growth health and security. We know this can be done because there are already many examples of this kind of strategic and broad-based approach seen up down the country, from the agricultural landscapes of Lincolnshire to the heathlands of Surrey and from internationally important wetlands in Dorset to the uplands of the Pennines, where diverse partnerships for Nature’s recovery are bringing a wide range of benefits for people as well as wildlife.
“Time is short but as we are setting out today with ambition, partnership and collaboration we can turn the decline of Nature toward recovery.”
The strategy will guide Natural England’s action to help the Government to achieve its statutory nature targets, as well as the international commitment to protect 30% of land and sea by 2030
The new approach will focus on outcomes, not processes.
The first is dubbed Recovering Nature; restoring natural systems like rivers, wetlands, forests by tackle root causes of decline and prioritising large-scale recovery.
The second outcome, Building Better Places, looks to embed nature into homes, infrastructure, and investment to create greener, healthier, more investible places.
Improving Health and Wellbeing means expanding access to green and blue spaces where people live and partnering with the health, education, and employment sectors to unlock the benefits of nature.
Finally, Delivering Security through Nature hopes to support nature-friendly farming, forestry, and fishing to supply food, water, clean air, and improve climate resilience in the future.
Natural England said these outcomes can be achieved through streamlined regulation, empowering local partners to take action on the ground. Natural England will also work to make nature-based solutions a part of early planning for new housing and infrastructure projects.
The strategy also highlights the importance of collaboration between public and private sectors to drive forward investment in nature from both public and private sources. This emphasis on collaboration is why Natural England engaged with more than 200 partners across business, local government and communities in creating the strategy.
This approach has already started to take shape, for instance in Natural England’s role as the first ever Lead Environmental Regulator for the Lower Thames Crossing. In the future, tools like Environmental Delivery Plans included in the Planning and Infrastructure Bill will aim to help the effort to build 1.5m homes needed while creating healthier, more nature-rich places.
The new strategy is the culmination of a shift that has already been taken place.
Natural England said collaboration between sectors is already in evidence in landscape recovery, which demonstrates how blended public and private finance can offer a boost for nature recovery and the local economy. The first project to enter the implementation phase, Boothby Wildland, will see at least 3km of waterways restored, and the site now employs more people than it did during conventional farming.
Green Social Prescribing demonstrated the link between nature and health and wellbeing, with 8,500 people being referred to projects using time outdoors to improve their health across England. Participants reported that connecting with nature helped them make significant improvements in their health, including reduced anxiety and depression. As a public investment, using nature to improve health had positive results. For every £1 invested, the programme delivered £2.42 in benefits, helping to reduce pressure on other services.
Last year, Natural England and the Wildlife Trusts acquired Lyscombe farm, which is expected to enable around 3,700 homes to be built in the Poole Harbour catchment over the next few years through a nutrient mitigation scheme. The project is funded through public and private investment. The farm is now improving soil health, supporting biodiversity, contributing to food security, and improving water quality, as well as enabling new houses to be built.
The Bradford and South Pennines Nature Recovery Partnership has driven nature recovery across an area of 30,000ha, the size of the Broads National Park. The partnership has brought nature to millions of people’s doorsteps through eight local nature reserves, as well as restoring landscapes such as Ilkley Moor. Alongside access to green space, the project creates benefits for climate resilience and natural flood management, in turn protecting communities. The new partnership has succeeded in driving £600K investment into Bradford and Calderdale.
