Why strategic investment is the unsung accelerator of rewilding

This post is by Rebecca Wrigley, CEO at Rewilding Britain.

When we talk about restoring nature in Britain, the conversation often defaults to government targets, public subsidies and corporate commitments. These are vital, but as the recent national security assessment has made clear, the rate of nature’s collapse is outpacing the speed of political decision making.

That is why, for the past five years, Rewilding Britain has focused on accelerating nature’s recovery through the Rewilding Innovation Fund. With over £1 million now awarded to rewilding projects across Britain, we have become a key driver of practical change. This isn’t just a financial milestone, it is a statement of intent and marker of progress in how we can build a different future outside of traditional systems.

We’re creating a blueprint for nature recovery
The fund aims to remove barriers to rewilding across Britain, supporting projects with everything from feasibility studies, to community engagement, to trialling the latest technology. Projects can receive up to £15,000 and are selected considering their potential for positive impact on people and nature, land and sea.

When we launched the Rewilding Innovation Fund, we identified a critical gap: the space between a bold idea and a bankable reality. We saw pioneering farmers, community groups and land managers stuck at the starting line, not for lack of will, but for lack of the agile, risk tolerant capital needed to test a new approach.

Today, thanks to the support of visionary individuals and businesses, 86 projects across England, Scotland and Wales have turned that will into action. The portfolio of projects we have funded reads as a blueprint for the future of large scale recovery. It’s a future where Borders Forest Trust’s Discover Nature Award, a youth-led initiative north of Moffat in the Scottish Borders, is reconnecting young adults with nature. It’s a future where Devon County Council is co-designing a marine rewilding roadmap with local fishers to restore both seabed habitats and fishing stocks. And it’s a future where communities in Ceredigion are using our Monitoring Framework to build the evidence base that will convince their neighbours that nature-led recovery is not a risk, but an investment.

Rewilding demand is outpacing capital available
This is the power of strategic funding. We have moved from a position of simply advocating for rewilding to catalysing and enabling projects. We are demonstrating that rewilding is not a passive act of letting go, but an active, evidence-led choice that delivers measurable outcomes for climate resilience, water security and local economies.

Yet, for all the progress, demand continues to outpace the capital. For every project we fund, there are countless more waiting. The £1 million we have deployed has unlocked significant hectares of restoration, but it has only scratched the surface of the potential.

If Britain is serious about meeting its environmental targets, it must treat rewilding as essential national infrastructure. That means creating the policy frameworks that de-risk investment and aligning public goods payments to reward the outcomes our Rewilding Innovation Fund projects prove are possible. Charitable investment is showing the way, it’s now time for the government to scale that blueprint up into a national strategy.