Explore how different enterprises and projects have approached acquiring, using and stewarding land for delivering shared benefits for business, community and environmental purposes.

This workshop is an opportunity to learn from the ecosystem of projects and enterprises in Oxfordshire that make use of land in their day to day work.

We’ll discuss topics including:

• Information and data on land ownership and use
• Accessing land
• Stewarding land
• Growing land based ventures

The workshop will make use of breakout rooms where participants can share challenges and learn from one another to progress their work – so be prepared to be inquisitive with questions and solutions for speakers and peers!

Who is it for?

This workshop is suitable for:

• A range of land based ventures including food and farming ventures, woodland enterprises, businesses situated in public parks or those responding to housing needs
• If you are exploring how to establish a land based venture, or if you are already involved in one and want to grow
• If you have an interest in the land system and land reform on a practical/pragmatic level (‘policy’ may be explored laterally, but we’re unlikely to focus on it for long)
• Those who want to make a livelihood from stewarding land (we’ll be exploring more enterprising aspects of land stewardship, rather than technical knowledge of different land management approaches)

What will I learn?

What you’ll take away from this event:

• Confidence in how to progress your land based venture/project
• Knowledge of some of the challenges and solutions in the UK land system, including access data, tenure and stewardship
• Solidarity with the ecosystem of land based ventures in the county – an understanding of the contribution that you can make as a citizens and enterprise in transforming the land system

Session format

• Intro and context – introducing the speakers, Shared Assets and background on land-based enterprises
• Q&A
• Breakout room discussions
• Case Studies from Who Owns Oxford, Good Food Oxford & Flo’s
• Q&A
• Breakout room discussions
• Scaling land based enterprises
• Q&A
• Breakout room discussions

Facilitator

Tom Carman – Shared Assets

Tom Carman is the Consultancy Coordinator at Shared Assets. He has a background in business development business support, project management and fundraising that enable people, projects and enterprises to build capacity and make an impact, particularly for land-based ventures.

Speakers

Audrey Versteegen – Who Owns Oxford

Audrey has been working with Who Owns Oxford to help map the pattern of land ownership in the county. Audrey is a researcher exploring participatory approaches to mapping land use.

Emma Burnett – Good Food Oxford

Emma is a researcher exploring community responses and solutions to improving the food system. She has been working with Good Good Oxford to map food producers in Oxfordshire, plus is Director of Cultivate Oxford – one of city’s veg box schemes.

Annie Davy – Flo’s in the Park

Flo’s is a Community Benefit Society and Social Enterprise Hub with community-owned café, nursery, refill shop, community midwives clinics and more. Based in Florence Park it opened in September 2018 in east Oxford, and has become a popular place for people to meet, eat, work, play, create, and learn. Located in the middle of a park with a strong environmental ethos it has nature in mind and wellbeing at its heart.

For more information about the eScalate programme , visit www.oxfordshirelep.com/escalate

Please note that this webinar is part-funded by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and is delivered as part of the eScalate programme to help SMEs. By engaging in this programme you are being offered assistance under the De Minimis regulation which allows a company to receive up to but not exceeding €200,000 of public funding (at the applicable exchange rate) of De Minimis aid over a rolling three-tax year fiscal period. This de minimis declaration does not cover undertakings engaged in: the primary production of agricultural goods and fisheries/aquaculture, road freight, services of general economic interest and export related activities and activities favouring domestic over imported goods. Please note, support cannot be given to undertakings (businesses) in difficulty. In order to receive support from this programme, you will be required to complete an application form and other relevant documentation.