Rewilding: Wildlife Trusts score £6 million cash injection to help the UK’s threatened species

An ambitious rewilding programme which would see Exmoor ponies, highland cows, and beavers return en masse to their roles as keystone habitat-shapers has received a substantial cash injection.

The Wildlife Trusts - a charity made up of 46 local Wildlife Trusts - has been given £6 million funding from the Ecological Restoration Fund, to help support its ambitious 'Transforming Nature's Recovery' rewilding programme.

It is expected to cost as much as £56 billion to fully realise the programme, but the Wildlife Trusts say it would help the UK fulfil its international obligations to protect 30% of land for nature by 2030, and to reach net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.

More than 40% of UK species are in decline while 15% are threatened with extinction, according to the latest State of Nature report, and the new rewilding fund would also help support other at-risk natives like pine martens, water voles, European eels and spiny lobsters.

Landscape recovery director Dr Rob Stoneman told PA: "Extinctions, pollution and wildfires make headlines with increasing frequency, and so it’s vital to go much further with nature recovery across the UK.

“We must create a place where wildlife, farming and people thrive together, where beavers work their magic and benefit communities, where seas are abundant with marine wildlife and where there’s easy access to nature to improve people’s lives," he continued.

“This game-changing donation from the Ecological Restoration Fund will bolster our work when nature needs us most.”

As well as funding the release of beavers and grazing animals, the money will also go towards a number of other projects, including regenerating marine ecosystems off the Welsh coast, a nature recovery corridor along the length of Hadrian’s Wall, and improving chalk streams, peatland and grasslands across the country.

The Wildlife Trusts also want to restore Atlantic rainforests in the damp, western regions of the British Isles. It is thought these forests once carpeted much of Cornwall, Wales, the Lake District and Western Scotland, but now only 1% of this habitat remains.

Ecological Restoration Fund chair Daniel Hotz said they were proud to support The Wildlife Trusts "in their ambitious vision for UK nature recovery".

“Recognising that our collective futures are intrinsically bound to the health of our environment, the urgency to address the UK’s troubling species decline and habitat degradation is paramount," he said.

“By knitting together and rejuvenating wild spaces, we’re not only creating richer habitats for wildlife but also bringing tangible benefits to local communities.”