Growing Partnerships for impact

Hi, I’m Alex Doorey and I’m VP of Corporate Affairs and Sustainability here at OVO Energy. We’ve been working with the Woodland Trust for over three years now, and in that time have planted over a million trees together, which is an incredible milestone. Nature-based solutions are really important to who we are as a company at OVO and tree planting remains an incredibly popular proposition with our customers. We believe in nature-based solutions. We believe in right tree, right place. And we believe in the benefits that tree planting can bring to communities. And all of this fits incredibly well with the Woodland Trust Tree Pack scheme. Going forward we want to plant over a million trees a year in the UK, and we couldn’t do that without the support of the Woodland Trust. So today I want to say thank you for everything that you do and look forward to years of partnership to come.
Hello, I’m Matthew Lawrence from the Environment Agency, West Midlands Area Environment Programme Team. We’re currently working in partnership with the Woodland Trust on the Pepper Wood extension project in Worcestershire, that’s seeing over thirty hectares of new woodland being created. This is part of a programme of tree planting we’ve got planned across the River Severn catchment that’s looking to help offset the carbon produced from our current flood defence programme. But we’re just not interested in capturing that carbon from the woodland but all these wider benefits. How we can maximise improving biodiversity, improving water quality, reducing flood risk, and how we can help reconnect local communities to their environment and deliver those social and health benefits that woodland can offer. That’s why we’re really excited to be working with the Woodland Trust on this project. Bringing their skills, knowledge and experience to really maximise those multiple benefits, to deliver for nature, for people and for the climate. We’re really looking forward to how the project develops over the next couple of years and working more with the Woodland Trust in the future.

Hi I’m Zelda Bentham. I’m the Group Head of Sustainability for Aviva, the UK’s leading insurance company. Aviva and the Woodland Trust have been talking through opportunities to work together for the past six years or so. The Woodland Trust supports our employee volunteering programme, and at the end of last year we became a carbon partner for the Trust. Our ambition as a company is to be Net Zero by 2040. We’re also reducing carbon emissions of our operations and supply chain by as much as possible by 2030. By 2040, we’re looking to do the same for the carbon emissions from our investments that we make for shareholders and on behalf of customers, as well as the activities we’re providing insurance cover for, such as motor and property and construction. At the same time as reducing our carbon footprint, we’re starting to fund nature-based solutions to remove the carbon from the atmosphere. We’re working with the Woodland Trust donating 10 million pounds to help buy land and plant new native woodlands, which will not only remove carbon but secure public access and benefit communities socially and economically, and also help restore and enhance biodiversity across the UK. We chose the Woodland Trust as the focus on both our organisations is creating a better future for people, the planet and biodiversity. The Woodland Trust through woodland creation, restoration and protection, and Aviva through insurance. Our care for people, our optimism for the future and our view that addressing climate change, biodiversity loss are interdependent and crucial for the long-term sustainability of the planet secures our partnership for years to come.
Hi, my name’s Karen Tighe and I’m Head of Group Responsible Business at Lloyds Banking Group. Three years ago, we pulled on our wellies and set out on a journey together. It was time to get closer to nature. Alongside our partner at the Woodland Trust we made a promise that over the next ten years we would plant ten million new trees together. And thanks to the hard work of so many people, we’re nicely on track. And today there are three million news trees in the ground, bringing wildlife, beauty and hope back to our countryside. This partnership is all about adding to the UK’s carbon sink. It’s about forming and deepening relationships with our clients and with communities, and it’s about engaging our sixty-five thousand colleagues. We’re building relationships in partnership with agriculture and landowners to plant through the MOREwoods and MOREhedges schemes. We’re working with community groups and schools in supporting the Free Tree programme. And three thousand colleagues have already pulled on their wellies to get involved with tree planting. Thousands and thousands more have got involved in sessions learning about nature, trees and biodiversity. They’ve taken part in family activities and they’ve taken a bit of time out to really benefit their mental health by spending time in nature. We’re really proud of what we’ve achieved so far, though there’s much more to do. The Woodland Trust is a tremendous partner to work with - dedicated, credible and creative. And for all of us, it’s a true partnership between the Woodland Trust and Lloyds Banking Group. And we say, thank you.

Hi everybody, I’m Louise Stonier and I’m the Chief Operating Officer of the Pets at Home vet business, and we’ve been working in partnership with the Woodland Trust since 2020. Our partnership with the Woodland Trust is hugely important to Pets at Home and we are incredibly proud to support their fantastic work. What we love is that it touches every area of our business from our veterinary practices to Pet Care centres, distribution centres and our support offices. The partnership was integral to our Better World Pledge strategy when it first launched back in 2020 and since then it has gone from strength to strength. The golden thread that runs through our partnership is our joint commitment to not only create new woodland but to protect and restore the rich areas of woodland we’re lucky to already have in the UK. While there is an awful lot to celebrate about our partnership and what we have already achieved together, three highlights so far for me would be, when we celebrated our Pets at Home 30th Anniversary in partnership with the Trust by dedicating a new tree for every colleague across twenty-one groves of woodland around the UK. We also installed a beautiful wooden bench in each grove so our colleagues and visitors would be able to sit and take a moment to enjoy the wonderful woodlands we’ve created together. Second would be our membership of the Woodland Carbon scheme, which we use to mitigate our residual buildings energy carbon. We’ve been part of this since 2020 and like all elements of our partnership this helps capture carbon across the country in a meaningful and credible way that we know is making a real difference. And then I’d say the final highlight and my own personal favourite would be our Pet Memory scheme which we launched in partnership with the Trust in 2021. And through this unique flagship scheme, around 400 of our veterinary practices make donations to the Trust in memory of the pets they’ve had the pleasure to care for. And in the first eighteen months of this scheme, around 390,000 of donations helped to protect, restore and create an area of over three thousand acres of woodland containing over 1.5 million trees. And I’m delighted to say that we’re well on our way to reaching twenty thousand acres by 2030, which will be incredible. We know that there are no words that console the loss of a beloved pet, but we hope that this lasting tribute helps to provide a small comfort to families who’ve had pets in our care. We truly are delighted to be a strategic partner with the Woodland Trust and I’m excited and hopeful for what the future holds for our partnership. Thank you.
Hello. I’m Ruth Cranston and I’m Director of Sustainability at Sainsbury’s. And at Sainsbury’s we are really proud of our partnership with the Woodland Trust and in fact we are celebrating twenty years of partnership next year. And over the years we’ve achieved a lot together. We’ve raised over £12 million pounds and that money has gone towards things like planting over 4.8 million native trees, and protecting thousands of acres of woodland across the UK. We’ve also supported initiatives like the Jubilee and Centenary Woods project. And also for our 150th Sainsbury’s birthday, the Woodland Trust helped us to plant a tree for every single colleague in the Sainsbury’s business. The Woodland Trust does such important work. It creates and maintains habitats for wildlife, and provides spaces for people to get out there and enjoy nature. And that’s so important for our business and also for our customers. And we’re delighted that our customers can support the Woodland Trust through purchases of our Woodland Range products like our free range eggs. So a big thank you to the Woodland Trust from everyone at Sainsbury’s. We are really looking forward to continuing our partnership together and doing the great work to address the climate and nature challenges faced.

My name’s Olivia Green and I’m the Sustainability Manager at Screwfix. Screwfix’s partnership with the Woodland Trust started back in October 2022. We’ve committed £50,000 to the Woodland Trust’s massive project in Snaizeholme in North Yorkshire. The project is going to turn a vast, treeless valley into a diverse habitat full of wildlife, including the rare red squirrel. It will take many years to achieve the end vision for that location, but Screwfix is really excited and proud to be a part of the project supporting nature recovery here in the UK. Our partnership benefits our sustainability goals at Screwfix as well. It supports our parent company Kingfisher’s commitment to becoming Forest Positive by funding the planting of trees in the UK and importantly, protecting and restoring nature through that tree planting. We chose to work with the Woodland Trust because they are the most reputable and responsible forestry organisation in the UK. It really resonates with our customers. We did a survey and a really large proportion of them supported us entering into this partnership. Our colleagues have also been really pleased to see Screwfix investing in nature. They’ve started to participate in Woodland Trust volunteering days which means that everyone gets to feel involved with our environmental commitment.