A family walking in nature
New forest in fall
A picture of British woodland
RENEW

Renewing biodiversity through a people-in-nature approach

Renewing biodiversity through a people-in-nature approach

RENEW is a five-year partnership programme to develop solutions to one of the major environmental challenges for humankind: the renewal of biodiversity.

We are in a biodiversity crisis. A million species of plants and animals are threatened with global extinction, and wildlife populations across much of the planet have been dramatically reduced. This is of profound concern because biodiversity underpins human existence. RENEW is working, with a sense of urgency, to reshape understanding and action on biodiversity renewal across scales, creating knowledge, and influencing national institutions, communities and individuals. Our focus is on a ‘people-in-nature’ approach, reflecting the two-way, dynamic relations between people and nature and the need to develop a relational approach to renew our life-support systems.

Funded by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), the programme is a collaboration between the University of Exeter and the National Trust, and has been co-designed and developed with over 30 partners from a diverse range of sectors. RENEW is led by Professors Krasimira Tsaneva-Atanasova, Kevin Gaston, and Catriona McKinnon from the University of Exeter, and Professor Rosie Hails from the National Trust.

News

An image of a speaker beginning a presentation with a screen that reads RENEW.

2 December 2024

Finding My Place at the RENEW Biodiversity Parliament

The power of collective intelligence This year’s Biodiversity Parliament, orchestrated by the ExCASES team, exemplified why large-scale research projects are so vital in addressing complex societal challenges. These events serve as crucial intersections where academic disciplines converge with industry expertise and policy insights. In the daily grind of data analysis, grant writing, and navigating peer [...]
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A photograph of trees lining a city street by Vitalijs-Barilo

12 November 2024

ExCASES Mission: Cultivating communities who care for urban trees

Research team Clare Bissell (Project Lead) - National Trust Michelle Twena - National Trust David Bavin  - National Trust Sarah Crowley - University of Exeter Matthew Heard - National Trust Partners Collaborators Birmingham Tree People, Birmingham    Street Trees for Living, London    Tiny Forest Programme, National    Fruit and Nut Village, Birmingham    Walking Forest, Exmouth    Eden Project Communities, [...]
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A photograph of a carnivorous bog plant with long sticky tendrils

22 October 2024

Bog Talk with Rose Ferraby & John Wedgwood Clarke

Above: Rose Ferraby with poet Richard Scott at a pool of sphagnum moss on Dartmoor.  After a spring of getting to know these sites, this seasonal shift feels somehow personal, rooted by our attentive observations through the year. We’ve been coming out to a number of different peatland sites on Dartmoor and Bodmin Moor to [...]
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