Our EDI work is focussed on supporting our partners and the organisations we work with, engaging with our research teams in relation to inclusive research practices and taking into consideration the needs and experiences of those most marginalised, and contributing to the Higher Education sector through the creation and sharing of best practices for recruitment, stakeholder engagement and staff support.
When adopting our people-in-nature approach to biodiversity renewal, we care about the populations who are disproportionately adversely affected and recognise protected characteristics so that we can design and deliver research towards finding solutions that are equitable and inclusive.
We work with environmental organisations who are committed to finding out how to address their responsibilities towards equity, diversity and inclusion. We engage with Wildlife and Countryside Link’s EDI working groups to discuss perspectives and challenges, and to identify specific actions for EDI training and fostering inclusive practices. We also provide advice and guidance to the National Trust with their Ex-CASES missions and engage with the Raven Network around supporting Black people and people of colour working within the environmental sector.
We support our researchers through delivering training on inclusive research design and methodology through seminars and workshops such as “Inclusivity in Qualitative Research”. We also provide expert guidance on inclusive collaboration, facilitation and intersectional co-production techniques for community/academic/organisation-level projects and partnerships.
As part of the Renewing Biodiversity Longitudinal Survey (ReBLS), we recognised that minoritised ethnic groups were underrepresented in the original sampling strategy, so we took a targeted approach to ensuring greater inclusivity and diversity within our dataset. We carried out a carried out a booster cross-section sample of people from minoritised ethnic backgrounds and analysed race, ethnicity and nationality categories and framing. As those of the Global Majority often face barriers in accessing green and natural spaces, our interview topic guide addressed intersections of identity underscoring the importance of capturing their perspectives.
Ex-CASES’ “Who decides for nature?” is a mission based on the People’s Plan for Nature (a Citizen’s Assembly process led by the National Trust, WWF and RSPB) exploring how to embed more participatory and deliberative decision-making processes in Environmental Non-Governmental Organizations, RENEW partners and the nature sector more broadly. Taking an EDI lens to the research question and methodology, we unpacked the assumptions of “deliberative democracy” from the perspective of marginalised and excluded voices and ensured that our demographics survey recognised the intersections of identity, background and needs of those contributing to our research.
We interviewed academics and representatives of community led initiatives to better understand their experiences, perspectives and challenges for working together on nature-related community-based research projects. Our analysis considers the interplay of privilege, power and systemic disadvantage, supporting the identification of challenges with respect to financial and regulatory systems upheld by universities and funding agencies. We make recommendations for best practice and highlight key opportunities for community-based activities to improve the quality and impact of research.
RENEW researchers have contributed to the Higher Education (HE) sector’s efforts to improve diversity and inclusion via the development of an Inclusive Recruitment Guide and a Good Sponsorship guide which have been shared within the University of Exeter and other HE institutions. Our work aims to improve the recruitment and retention of marginalised applicants to HE positions of employment, and to support the career development of early career researchers and staff.
We collaborated with the Changing the Environment (CtE) Programme of Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) to share our findings and lessons learned around embedding EDI within RENEW and provide examples of EDI best practice. We presented at an EDI retreat for CtE practitioners for joint learning, discussion, collaboration, peer support and future directions.
For Advance HE’s “EDI Conference 2025: Embedding Intersectionality in HE Practice” we delivered a presentation and workshop on “Innovation Through Co-production: disrupting the hierarchy and moving beyond consensus.” In this workshop we demonstrated that actively engaging and representing those who are most marginalised brings important perspectives and challenges into account that can creatively improve innovations and increase the likelihood of sustainable outputs.
We are committed to social and environmental justice and have created our Environmental Justice Forum for RENEW researchers and partners to engage in honest conversations about environmental justice and its demands. Here we share ideas and learnings around personal, organisational, and leadership-level changemaking, and identify calls to action and next steps for our stakeholders and for environmental policy.
