Community Involvement Policy and Approach

September 2024 v1

 1. Summary

1.1 This document sets out:

• The role of community involvement and its importance
• How FFC engages with communities local to its sites
• How FFC can improve community involvement in the future, developing our approach into a community wealth building model.
  

1.2 Our objectives are to:

• Encourage effective local community engagement
• Ensure that embedded throughout FFC there is a clear understanding of the need to engage with communities about decisions which affect them.
• Enable comments or suggestions obtained from community engagement to have an impact on decision making and the design process.
• To work towards building community wealth through more local employment, support for local businesses and providing opportunities for affordable housing where possible.
  

1.3 Our definition of community:

Community is those geographically local to, and most affected by our projects. We would therefore anticipate that the communities we interact with are not typically spread across a wide region, although this may be helpful and appropriate for some for large scale projects. Community, in this sense, is not limited to any specific communities of interest (e.g. mountain biking) but may encompass those groups as part of the wider community.

1.4 Our definition of community wealth building:

Community wealth building (CWB) is an action-focused, place-centred approach to involvement with the communities defined above. CWB retains and redirects more wealth back into local economies via mechanisms such as local employment, support for local businesses, and social inclusion and empowerment. In the CWB context, wealth is defined as any asset which contributes to the wellbeing of people. The term therefore encompasses environmental and social outcomes
as well as financial.

1.5 The key aspects of community involvement include:

• Developing a network of relationships between FFC, individuals, voluntary and community groups and suppliers.
• Making sure the views, objectives and goals of the local communities have been listened to and understood.
• Clear and open communication to ensure that information is made accessible to all groups
• Develop pragmatic approaches for the implementation of projects that incorporate the interests of local communities while also taking into consideration the context of each site.

2. Intentions / Objectives

While we believe the work we are doing is important in fighting both loss of biodiversity and climate change, we are aware that nature restoration projects can negatively impact the areas they occupy when carried out poorly and without community involvement. Those that feel the effects of these negative impacts most acutely are often those living and working nearby and by setting out our policy and future goals, we hope to empower the communities local to us, creating opportunities for them to be involved in decision making and fostering good relationships with our neighbours.  

While we as a company are aiming to make positive land use changes whose benefits are impactful and wide reaching, we do not wish to achieve this to the detriment of those who already live and work on and beside the land we are restoring. In the long run we wish to create/maintain employment and educational opportunities on our sites as well as nurture a cooperative ethos to ensure that everyone can benefit from the areas we conserve, for generations to come.

3. Principles

The key principles of involvement that we adhere to are as follows:

• Careful planning and preparation. Through adequate and inclusive planning, we ensure that the design, organisation, and implementation of our involvement with local communities serves both a clearly defined purpose and the needs of the groups we are involved with.
• Constructive discussion. We aim to accommodate requests for meetings to discuss local issues or ideas within 6 weeks (1) These discussions are formed around the desire to be open and to learn, listening to the needs of the community, and exploring new ideas unconstrained by predetermined outcomes. We wish to learn and apply information in ways that generate new options, and we rigorously evaluate community involvement activities for effectiveness.
• Respect. We respect any alternative views and perspectives within local communities and are happy to listen. We will endeavour to either incorporate those views into our own viewpoint or educate and inform without condescension.
• Transparency and Trust. We are clear and open about our processes, and provide an easy to access public record of the land owners, managers, outcomes, and management practices. We publish all data collected regarding the sites we manage on our website.
• Impact and Action. We ensure each participatory effort has real potential to make a difference, and that participants are aware of that potential.
• Inclusion and Demographic Diversity. We aim to equally incorporate diverse people, voices, ideas, and information to lay the groundwork for quality outcomes. (1) As recommended by the Scottish Land Commission https://www.landcommission.gov.scot/downloads/628e17641fd5d_Comm%20Engagement%20Protocol%202021.pdf
• Collaboration and Shared Purpose. We actively seek out and support participants, governments, community institutions and others, encouraging collaborative work to advance the common good.

4. How We Engage / Our Commitments

The steps which make up our involvement process are split into three stages.

4.1 Prior to any woodland creation, peatland restoration, biodiversity projects, or change of use of land:

• We carry out a public consultation for all projects. We make sure these are early enough in the design process that there is still opportunity for communities to influence the decision making process.
• We make contact with local community groups, setting up meetings so we can listen to their views.
• We make sure that all community groups are aware of our timeframes and key milestones from the inception of the project through to completion and further.
• We will set Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) for community involvement for each project as it is designed, which will be closely monitored and reported on in monthly internal community involvement meetings.
• We make sure that a robust financial plan is in place to ensure that our obligations and community objectives can be met.

4.2 During the implementation of a project:

• We create a formal involvement plan for each site. This plan provides a named contact for each site, in addition to details of what we have done so far, and our plan for how to develop our involvement with the community in future. This plan is reviewed on a yearly basis and audited for effectiveness.
• We provide both direct as well as indirect community involvement approaches e.g. site signage/information, website with feedback options to appeal to all users.
• We create a live issues log for each site, providing a further pathway for local communities to contact us.

4.3 After the implementation of a project:

• 1-2 years after the initial implementation of a project is complete, we reach out to those who responded in our initial consultation for further feedback.
• We measure our success against our initial KPIs and community objectives and use the results of this to improve our processes and policies for future projects.
• 5 years after initial implementation, we will hold a second full public consultation allowing the community to provide views and feedback on the completed project.
• Once the second consultation is held, we will use the results of the feedback to inform and alter our existing policies and processes, publishing our results for full accountability.

5. Protocols & Standards

5.1 We are looking to be an active part of creating new high integrity standards and sector wide approaches to community involvement, through both the FIRNS (The Facility for Investment Ready Nature in Scotland) project and by obtaining B-corp certification. 

Version 1.0 20/09/24 
Authored by: Grace Notcutt & Corin Jack
Reviewed by: FFC Community Involvement Group 
Approved for release: David Elliot, CEO