The Rivers Trust Press Release 01.11.2021
After a successful development phase funded by Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, Defra and Environment Agency, the project – led by The Rivers Trust, Wyre Rivers Trust and Triodos Bank UK – is moving towards completion. The Wyre Catchment Community Interest Company has been established as an independent entity to raise £850k of financial investment to go alongside a £526k grant from the Woodland Trust via the Northern Forests Grow Back Greener programme, as part of Defra’s Nature For Climate Fund.
The money raised in the form of a nine-year loan will be used to deliver over 1,000 highly targeted measures, including tree planting, creation of temporary water storage areas, leaky dams and a network of hedges that will significantly reduce flooding to local communities at risk. It will be repaid through the sale of ecosystem services to organisations that will seek to benefit from those interventions including flood risk reduction, carbon sequestration, increasing biodiversity and improving water quality. Local farmers and landowners will then be paid to host and maintain those NFM assets.
Mark Lloyd, CEO of The Rivers Trust, said: “During COP26 and the build up to the biodiversity summit in China in 2022 we are going to hear a lot of talk about private finance for nature-based solutions to the climate and biodiversity emergencies on Planet Earth. This project is a rare example of that talk being converted into action at a local scale to create a template which is already being replicated elsewhere in the UK. This project could not be delivered by any one organisation on its own, but by a collection of groups taking collaborative action, we can bring about multiple benefits for people and
For more information and for a link to the original article, please click here.
