Green Party activists in North Staffordshire have given their support to the ‘Hedgerow Heroes’ campaign launched by the Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE).
Earlier this month CPRE launched in parliament research carried out by the Organic Research Centre, the UK’s leading independent organic research organization. Their work covers a wide remit including food security and climate change.
The report ‘Hedge Fund: investing in hedgerows for nature, climate and economy’ emphasizes the importance of hedgerows to the British countryside and the way they ‘complement and enhance the unique character of our beautiful countryside’.
It also highlights the role they could play in addressing climate change, boosting the economy, and improving all our wellbeing.
The Organic Research Centre and CPRE are calling for the UK’s hedgerow network to be extended by 40% to help the government meet its goal of achieving net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.
The report sets out recommendations calling for action to be taken by government, local authorities, and farmers. These include the government developing a land management scheme that incentivizes planting hedgerows, councils incorporating hedgerows into urban developments and farmers managing existing and new hedgerows with the needs of nature in mind.
In July the CPRE, along with 14 other charities including the Woodland Trust and the Tree Council sent an open letter to the government describing hedgerows as the ‘unsung heroes’ of the countryside and calling on ministers as the COP26 summit in Glasgow approaches to show ‘real leadership’ by committing to the 40% target and in doing so help to create a more ‘resilient, beautiful and biodiverse’ countryside.
A spokesperson for North Staffs Green Party said, “Hedgerows are an iconic feature of the British landscape, they are home to some of our best loves plants and animals”, adding that “it is shocking that so much of the network has been lost in a comparatively short space of time”.
The spokesperson went on to say, “this campaign addresses many of the things we want to do as part of our rewilding plans, not least helping to create wildlife corridors between increasingly fragmented habitats, and we are happy to give it our full backing”.
The CPRE have also launched a petition calling on the government to increase the UK’s hedgerow network by 2050, at the time of writing this had gathered over 35,000 signatures.