This year took quite an unexpected turn didn’t it? We thought we’d provide a quick update on how things are progressing with our inaugural co-forest being planned for the Bath and Bristol area, in light of Covid-19 and the lockdown.

We softly launched our organisation back in March and we are so excited to have already raised over £150,000 worth of pledges from local businesses and the general public.

As you know we aimed to purchase land this summer and begin planting in Autumn/Winter 2020. However, due to the unexpected outbreak of COVID-19, we have decided to adjust our timeframes slightly. 

We’d like to assure you that we are in no way cancelling our plans to create a forest in the area, we’re simply slowing things down and moving some of our plans to 2021 instead.

To make the most of this extra time, we will be learning more about creating a biodiverse and sustainable forest and developing new ways to get others involved in Co-forest:Acorn. That way the pledges we receive can make the best impact possible!

We are continuing to make progress, however, and are excited to share some of the things we’ve been up to over the past couple of months: 

• Co-forest has now been formed to operate as a not-for-profit entity. We’re a company limited by guarantee which means that we have no shareholders and are able to qualify for full charitable status.
• We welcomed Steve Clark (Chairman of Ecosurety) to our Board of Directors. Steve’s experience within the environmental sector will be invaluable to our plans for Co-forest going forwards.
• Our application with Triodos Bank is now complete and we will soon be in a position to start receiving your pledges. We plan to be as flexible as possible when that time comes as we know that the current climate may be harder for some than others.
• We’re currently developing our individual giving options, so that it will be possible to gift a plot of forest to a loved one in their name. 

In the meantime, we’d love for as many people to get involved as possible and make this a real collaborative effort across the region. Please continue to support us on social media and help to spread the word.

Thank you to everyone who has gotten involved so far and we look forward to letting you all know on how Co-forest:Acorn continues to progress.

If you haven’t had a chance to make a pledge yet but would like to do so, you can contact us for a chat about the options available to you.