Rural sustainability UK

The aim of this page is to recognise, celebrate and encourage the self-empowerment of UK community agency networks (CANs) and community groups' activism to strengthen and deepen Rural sustainability and the resilience of rural communities. Learn about how communities positively impact through different projects and collaborations.

Future Rural Voices: perspectives on the countryside’s future

Authors: Campaign to Protect Rural England, 2.35 mins.

Date: 2026-05-07

CPRE: 100 years in 100 seconds

Authors: Campaign to Protect Rural England, 2.24 mins.

Date: 2026-01-06

CPRE maps

CPRE maps showing that 55 per cent of England's countryside could be at increased risk as a consequence of the Government's reforms of the planning system: Protecting open countryside

• Plunkett Foundation, helps rural communities in the UK to take control of the issues affecting them through community ownership. ^W The Foundation's work includes:

• Supporting the growing network of community-owned shops across the UK
• Promoting and supporting wider forms of community-owned enterprises and co-operatives in rural communities
• Promoting and supporting community food and farming enterprises
• Advocacy and awareness raising with the purpose of increasing awareness of the potential of community-ownership in rural areas and making it easier for rural communities to take action

• Plunkett Co-operative Pubs Online
• Community Shops Online
• Fiery Spirits, Community of Practice
• Planning Help, a project of the Campaign to Protect Rural England
• One Planet Council, supporting One Planet Developments
• Pub Is The Hub
• Saving Pubs, campaigning resources from CAMRA, Campaign for Real Ale
• Village SOS, support network for community businesses

• Buses for every community, takeaction.cpre.org.uk, added 09:36, 24 January 2021 (UTC)
• Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) is a registered charity with over 60,000 members and supporters. CPRE campaigns for a "sustainable future" for the English countryside. They state it is "a vital but undervalued environmental, economic and social asset to the nation." They aim to "highlight threats and promote positive solutions." They campaign using their own research to lobby the public and all levels of government. ^W

Food UK, Localism UK, Sustainable transport activism UK, Urban sustainability UK, Neighbourhood Planning, Community resources UK, Towards a more democratic and climate friendly way of meeting housing need across England, South East England, London and South East England, Commons UK

local information can be found, or shared, via our many UK location pages

External links

• Action with Communities in Rural England (ACRE), charity that acts as the national organisation for thirty-eight Rural Community Councils across England. ^W
• Common Ground, charity and lobby group that promotes "local distinctiveness" ^W
• Making sure government policies and programmes benefit rural businesses and communities, policy information from GOV.UK (government)
• Natural England, non-departmental public body of the UK government
• The Rural Challenge, Achieving sustainable rural communities for the 21st century, cpre.org.uk, August 2010
• Rural Shops Alliance
• Village car-share, sister site of liftshare.com