Lantern’s Post

Yesterday many big garden centres (including B&Q) teamed up with environmental charities, nursery owners and growers to ask Keir Starmer to put an end to peat sales as soon as possible 🛑 The Peat-free partnership included signatures from: - Chris Packham - Alys Fowler - B&Q - The Co-op - Dave Goulson - Guy Shrubsole - Plantlife - Buglife - The National Trust - Soil Association Plus many more! The Peat-free Partnership is funded by Esmée Fairbairn Foundation and hosted by the wild plant conservation charity Plantlife. Why do our peatlands need protecting? - These wetland habitats make up around 12% of the UK land area - They support amazing biodiversity - They help tackle climate change due to their ability to store carbon. - It is believed that UK peatlands store over 3 billion tonnes of carbon! Peat was a popular choice for gardeners as well as a heat source for many homes. Great work by the Peat-Free Partnership - and all the people/organisations who've collaborated to get this letter out there! 💪 #peatfree #endpeatsales #climatechange #biodiversity

Today is Earth Day, and every day really should be a day we do better to take of our planet. Environmental conservation is good business, too, for myriad reasons, some of which: without a healthy environment local, regional, national, and global business will suffer; there's opportunity for tremendous economic growth in a greener economy; it helps businesses build real relationships with people; it's effective marketing & PR; it provides opportunities for businesses to work alongside people to make a difference in their communities - where it matters most. People, not consumers. So how can you/anyone get involved? Start local and make a difference in your community. Every conservation organization needs volunteers and has events on their calendar. ALL conservation orgs need donations to fund their work. Here are a few ATL & GA conservation organizations for y'all: - Native Fish Coalition GA Chapter (ping me for info) - Chattahoochee Riverkeeper - Chad 🌏 Livsey Project - Finding The Flint.org (Hannah Palmer) - South River Watershed Alliance (Margaret Spalding) - Flint Riverkeeper.org (Gordon Rogers) - Patagonia Action Works - connects you with local orgs where you live Kudos, too, to Athletic Brewing Co.'s Two For The Trails initiative for raising more than $4MM to date! Please add more local & non-local orgs w/ links in the comments, thanks. #CommerceAndConservation #EarthDayEveryday #ATLconservation #WaterIsLife #EarthDay #StartLocal #LocalWaters *recent photo from ATL metro area

This week we mark the 75th anniversary of the 1949 National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act. The Act built the foundations for modern nature conservation, enshrining in law protections for our wild spaces. It led the way for our iconic network of National Landscapes, Parks and Trails (collectively known as Protected Landscapes). Which is your favourite? From the Peak District to Exmoor National Park, Protected Landscapes welcome almost 270 million visitors a year and are home to internationally important habitats and our most iconic species. All in, they contain half of England’s priority habits and Sites of Special Scientific Interest, 60% of deep peat and around 88% of heather and acid grassland habitats. This makes them vital to restore nature and boost the nation’s health through access to nature. Personally, a childhood trip to the Jurassic Coast in Dorset, and visiting the vast open spaces of Northumberland, stand out in my memory. However, many of these landscapes are in a poor condition, with the wildlife that lives within their boundaries in steep decline and their waterways polluted. Did you know that less than 40% of rivers in National Parks are in good ecological status? This needs to be reversed and it is now more important than ever to invest in nature and protect these spaces. I had the privilege to support the English National Parks and the Broads Authority with an income generation feasibility and scoping project in 2023 with Philanthropy Company. Like many charities and other nonprofits, diversifying income streams is crucial for their ability to invest in nature restoration projects, and test and learn from other nature-based innovation iniatitives and campaigns. #Philanthropy #Nature #UKNationalParks National Parks UK

A partnership led by the government of Mongolia and The Nature Conservancy (TNC) has raised $198 million in commitments towards conservation and sustainable communities, with similar initiatives in up to 20 other countries in the pipeline. Eternal Mongolia aims to create 14 mln hectares of new protected areas in the country’s grasslands, forests, deserts, wetlands, and rivers through a Project Finance for Permanence (PFP) initiative that includes $71 mln from private and philanthropic donors. It will strengthen the management of the country’s existing National Protected Areas, covering 47 mln ha, and benefit at least 24,000 households in community-managed practices like sustainable grazing across a further 34 mln ha. “The scale of impact this Eternal Mongolia initiative has is, frankly, quite transformative. It will be the largest land and freshwater conservation initiative that TNC has ever been engaged in across our 75-year history,” Ryan Demmy Bidwell, global director of PFP at TNC, told our reporter Thomas Cox. Read and subscribe: https://lnkd.in/d5Tg6sKH

Our landscape restoration initiatives are about more than just trees. Here’s how we’re creating sustainable ecosystems: ▫️Community Collaboration: Co-developing tailored projects with local communities to enhance both ecological and economic conditions. ▫️Forest Connectivity: Improving forest areas and soil health through strategic reforestation and natural regeneration. ▫️Biodiversity Conservation: Protecting and expanding wildlife corridors while managing ecological threats. ▫️Water Resource Management: Developing strategies with communities to safeguard water recharge zones for long-term sustainability. Ready to see real change? Learn how our holistic approach is going beyond reforestation by restoring whole landscapes. https://lnkd.in/e8pR-NYn #Eden #LandscapeRestoration #GenerationRestoration #CSRGoals #Nonprofit

Nature charities urge stronger protection for UK seas 🌊 The UK has become the first nation to map and estimate the amount of #carbon stored in its seabed habitats, including in Marine Protected Areas (MPAs). Seabed disturbances are identified as key threats to #BlueCarbon stores. 📍Read more here https://lnkd.in/enxi8SCi #marine #seabed #MPA #marineprotectedareas

4 reasons GrowRoom donate to Rewilding Britain (and a bonus pic of my rewilded front garden) 🌻 1️⃣ Rewilding offers hope and the opportunity to give nature (and us) a fighting chance — 12% of the UK’s greenhouse gas emissions could be captured by restoring and protecting native woodland, peatlands, heaths and species-rich grasslands over 30% of Britain. 2️⃣ Through their Rewilding Innovation Fund and Rewilding Challenge Fund, Rewilding Britain have supported 46 rewilding projects with over £700,000 funding carbon capture, seagrass restoration, tree seeding and species reintroduction. 3️⃣ They’ve also developed a "Rewilding Monitoring Framework" to track ecological, social and economic data from sites across Britain — a crucial step towards building the evidence that shows rewilding's amazing benefits. 4️⃣ And they're helping to rewild our seas too — working closely with decision-makers to increase the understanding of marine rewilding, and creating a "marine naturalness map", looking across British waters to identify high-potential hotspots for rewilding. #rewilding #climateemergency

💸 How would you spend $91 billion for conservation?! 💸 In a sector dominated by charities, the majority of conservation projects are funded by donors. ‼️ Our figures at Conservation Careers suggest that a whopping 88% of professional conservationists are reliant on donor funding for their work. But how much funding is available for nature? 2020 figures from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) estimated the global funding pot to be between USD 78-91 billion per year. In 2021, nine philanthropic foundations made the largest ever donation to nature conservation, pledging $5 billion to help protect 30% of land and sea. That’s a lot of money, and it’s likely to grow each year as biodiversity conservation keeps becoming more important for people, governments and companies across the globe. What if you had the skills to secure some of these funds, and turn your ideas, dreams and projects into reality? The more skilled you are as a fundraiser, the more money you’ll secure, and the more conservation you’ll get done. But few professional and aspiring conservationists have any formal training in fundraising. That’s why we’ve built our online training, Fundraising for Conservation Projects, led by multi-award-winning conservationist Dr Kate Evans. We’re offering you discounted access until Friday 23rd August at 11:59 PM (UK time). Turn your conservation project ideas into reality with fundraising skills! 💡 ✨ https://buff.ly/3YrT5EA #ConservationCareers #ConservationJobs #Fundraising4Conservation

Grasslands, forests, and tidal marshes in Canada will grow stronger thanks to a new donation from Aviva Canada! Aviva’s support is making vital conservation efforts possible: · Restoring more than 500 hectares of Saskatchewan’s native grasslands – providing habitat for an estimated 30 species at risk in the province. Grasslands are one of the world’s endangered ecosystems and are critical to our health and well-being. · Supporting tidal marsh conservation and study work to rebuild degraded habitat, and creating opportunities for greater scale conservation efforts, covering more than 300 hectares along the St. Lawrence Gulf and Estuary. · Restoring forests in Manitoba to improve connectivity between habitats, renew degraded landscapes, and sequester carbon. Read more about the projects supported by Aviva’s donation: https://brnw.ch/21wJ8mz

Hey (Re)Insurance Friends! Check out just a few of the ROI outcomes pointed out in this post about the BILLION OYSTER PROJECT, one of my favorite initiatives. And, TEACHERS, a reminder - you can get your students involved with the Billion Oyster Project in many ways, related to many content areas: science, social studies, mathematics, climate education. And you don't have to be in NYC. Check out this recent article and the links.