Community champions celebrate in New Forest

The Campaign for National Parks celebrated another year of its award-winning community engagement programme in the New Forest this weekend. Over 70 volunteer community champions from the Campaign for National Parks' Mosaic programme, which inspires people who do not think or know that National Parks are open to them to get involved, gathered at Avon Tyrell activity centre in the New Forest National Park.

Mosaic community champions are all volunteers who live in urban minority ethnic communities and inspire other people from their communities to enjoy and look after National Parks.

The celebrating volunteers sampled a range of activities available in National Parks including mountain biking, a coastal excursion, a wildlife walk through the wonderful flora and fauna of the forest, a gourmet tour of local produce and a farm visit. The New Forest National Park also benefited as the volunteers rolled their sleeves up and got stuck into some conservation maintenance along the beach at Lepe Country Park.

The event reminded many of the community champions, who between them have already given over 1,800 volunteer days to the project and introduced over 6,000 new people to the National Parks, to make sure more people from their communities experience the many benefits that the National Parks offer for themselves.

Mosaic community champion Ian Reid said: "It's been great to meet other people from around the country, who are all so enthusiastic about promoting the National Parks in their communities. We've given each other ideas and shared our experiences, and I think it's inspired many of the newer champions about how they can introduce the National Parks to others."

Mosaic community champion Arzoo Iqbal from Southampton, who has organised many trips to the New Forest, explains: "Mosaic has given me the skills and the confidence to take many Asian elders out into the New Forest. Many of them had never been out here before, even though the National Park is on their doorstep, and they really enjoyed the fresh air and the natural beauty."

Helen Jackson, chief executive of the Campaign for National Parks said: “National Parks were created so that these beautiful and iconic landscapes could be kept safe and accessible for everyone to enjoy. This is just as relevant today as it was 75 years ago when the Campaign for National Parks was founded. And it’s why we are so keen to celebrate the ground-breaking work our Mosaic programme is doing to open up National Parks to new audiences.”

The Mosaic programme is funded by Natural England through Access to Nature as a part of the Big Lottery Fund's Changing Spaces programme.

For further information, please contact:
Nina Arwitz, Mosaic programme manager, Campaign for National Parks: 07738 929 729
Natasha Roe, communications consultant, Campaign for National Parks: 07528 663141

Notes to editors
The Campaign for National Parks is an independent charity that inspires people to enjoy and look after National Parks. We do this by safeguarding these iconic landscapes against threats and making sure they are open to everyone to enjoy. 2011 is our 75th anniversary year.

Mosaic is our award-winning programme, which inspires people who do not think or know that National Parks are open to them to get involved. Mosaic is a model of community engagement delivered through community champions who live and work in urban communities. The Mosaic programme is supported by the Youth Hostels Association and 10 National Park Authorities in England funded by Access to Nature, with match funding from Nationwide Building Society, Defra and the partners themselves.

Access to Nature is run by Natural England and is part of The Big Lottery Fund's Changing Spaces programme launched in November 2005 to help communities enjoy and improve their local environments. Natural England manages this £25 million Lottery-funded programme on behalf of a consortium of twelve national environmental organisations comprising BTCV, British Waterways, Environment Agency, Forestry Commission, Greenspace, Groundwork UK, Land Restoration Trust, The National Trust, Natural England, RSPB, the Wildlife Trusts and the Woodland Trust. Through this programme, it is Natural England's ambition to create opportunities for people from all backgrounds to have greater access to our natural environment and bring a lasting change to their awareness and understanding as well as improved links to the natural world, which many of us can take for granted.