| Synopsis: |
The National Forest project was established in 1995 with the aim of creating a new English forest across a 200 square mile area, embracing parts of Leicestershire, Staffordshire and Derbyshire. The National Forest's purpose is to increase woodland cover to a third of The National Forest area, whilst demonstrating sustainable, multi-purpose land use, including growing timber, providing leisure and tourism facilities and developing natural habitats. Key features of The National Forest are its linkage of previously isolated ancient woodlands and the establishment of new nature reserves, as well as the provision of a framework for farm diversification and the regeneration of former coalfields. It is delivering tangible environmental, economic and social benefits to an area of the Midlands - much of which was suffering economic and environmental decline - through planting trees to create new woods and forests. Its achievement is not so much in trebling the proportion of land with tree cover to 18 per cent, but that, in so doing, it has helped to regenerate the local economy, open up the Forest to greater public use and improve the natural environment.The success has been built on the commitment and skills of all the partner organisations, and The National Forest Company has played a crucial leadership role to enable the project to deliver effectively the multiple benefits of forestry. There needs to be a systematic approach to disseminating the company's experiences so that lessons learned can be exploited across England. |