Our strategy to inspire action for our environment

Following the launch of our strategy at Dynamic Earth in September, our CEO Barry Fisher shares his hopes for the future and our goal to support and inspire action for everyone in Scotland.

Our charity has a long and very successful history, in supporting and working with communities, businesses and the public sector and in helping to achieve our shared ambitions to improve Scotland’s environment. 

Over the years we’ve developed an amazing network of committed and hard-working individuals, community groups, schools and businesses across the country that do everything they can to improve the places that matter to them.

Historically we are well known for some long-standing successful activities that enable people to take action including:

• our community initiatives Beautiful Scotland and It’s Your Neighbourhood;
• our work with children and young people through the international Eco-Schools programme;
• our national Spring Clean - the biggest national mass volunteering litter pick in Scotland;
• our high-profile awards that we present to parks, beaches and businesses; and
• the environmental training we offer across all sectors to help them become climate, nature and litter literate.

We are very proud of all these great initiatives. However, we would like to build on these and achieve much more - because there is such a pressing need to do so much more when we are facing the huge threats of climate change, biodiversity loss and a litter emergency.

This is why it has been a priority of mine to refresh our vision and mission, to place it all in our strategy. One strategy that builds on what we are good at and inspires future environmental action, by us all, to keep Scotland beautiful.

Our strategy is a positive agenda for widespread change – and we believe that everyone and every sector has a role to play in it. The scale of the challenge requires nothing less than this.

It’s based on strong and effective partnerships with organisations that seek strategic and positive change – that want to make a real difference.

At our strategy launch event we were delighted to have contributions from just some of those we work with, including The Diffley Partnership, VisitScotland, Stonehaven Horizon Project, Willowgate Activity Centre and Wallacehall Academy. All speakers offered something special – sharing why our work mattered to them, enhanced their own plans and ambitions and inspired further action.

I was inspired to hear how members of #TeamKSBScot support, amplify and enthuse these people, communities and businesses as they work to keep Scotland beautiful in their own ways.

Our stated ambitions will not be a surprise – we support Government policy and indeed the national mission to become a Net Zero Nation, to become litter free and develop a circular economy, to restore and enhance nature and biodiversity and to improve the places where people live and work.

We do this by working in genuine collaboration with partners in business and local government, and with communities themselves.

We are positive in our approach and believe that communities and organisations can make a difference by taking action and celebrating these actions and achievements.

We have the ambition to make the scale of challenges we face – and we believe that change across the whole country is possible.

We continue to be innovative in our approach – embrace the opportunities to work differently and use the knowledge and experience gained by working withpartners here and abroad.

But we will also use our own knowledge and confidence to influence others both here in Scotland and through our international network – as we have already done with our marine litter and Climate Ready Classrooms activity in New Zealand.

We are extremely proud of the work that we have done to ensure that we reach more people, more communities and more organisations to inspire them to take action – but there is now an urgent need to scale up this work and reach every community and organisation across the country that wants to take action.

For too long Keep Scotland Beautiful has only been seen as the name of our charity – we hope that our strategy will be the start of people seeing it as a national mission, one which will be achieved when we create a society that is Climate, Nature and Litter Literate and where all communities are actively engaged in environmental improvements.

Our goal is to support you and inspire action for us all to make a positive change and so our partners opinions, their hopes and their desires are pivotal to our work.

We want to do more. We want to work with you to develop new ideas, expand and improve what we know already works. Help us, support us, and together we can reach more people, more communities, and inspire more people into taking action for our environment.

Scotland is beautiful – but we cannot take it for granted.