Pictured above: The River Adur, credit Frank Bull. Also used in the Adur Valley Heritage Trail
Horsham District Council, working in collaboration with several other organisations, has supported some 27 farmers and land managers who are part of the Adur Farming Cluster Group to successfully secure £500,000 of government funding for a landscape recovery programme to improve the River Adur.
The project will form an important part of the Wilder Horsham District initiative, which is a partnership between Horsham District Council and the Sussex Wildlife Trust, aiming to establish connected habitats that support wildlife and reverse the decline in biodiversity.
The Adur River Restoration Project is one of only 22 nationwide projects to receive funding from the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA) which will revitalise and restore the River Adur and its catchment, creating a new ribbon of habitats running through a wildlife-friendly farmed landscape.
The Landscape Recovery funding will be used to support the developmental of plans that will restore nature, reduce flood risks, improve water quality, and boost biodiversity in the River Adur area. It will support farmers and landowners to explore how new features and habitats can be created on their land, such as by removing embankments to allow flooding, and to improve the health of the soil through regenerative farming techniques.
Land managers will each be contributing a portion of their landholding, mostly their floodplains, to create a largely connected area of at least 766 hectares of new habitat and river restoration, stretching from the Knepp estate to Shoreham, where the river meets the Sussex Bay restoration of the sea beds and kelp forests along the Sussex Coast.
The changes at this scale will require strong collaboration between all of the farmers and landowners involved in the project, and the organisations that are supporting it. There will also be public engagement to explain the proposed changes to the communities that live and work in the area.
Horsham District Council Cabinet Member for Environment and Rural Affairs Cllr James Wright commented:
It is a fantastic achievement to have been awarded these vital funds after such a competitive application process which has taken many months of collaborative work.
To have been one of only 22 projects nationally to be selected, we clearly demonstrated against stiff competition that we have pioneering ideas that will both improve the natural landscape and reverse the decline in nature.
The project has been praised by DEFRA for being farmer- led. My thanks go out to all the partners we have worked with to get us this far and I look forward to the next delivery stage of this ambitious programme.
Cllr James Wright, Cabinet Member for Environment and Rural Affairs
For media queries please email press@horsham.gov.uk .