Haslemere-based Community Orchard Project South East (COPSE) have been awarded a small grant from the Surrey Wildlife Trust's Nextdoor Nature Communities Grant. The Guildford Borough Council green space, at Roman Farm, Park Barn estate, has been earmarked for a small community orchard in Winter 2024/5. The team will be conducting a baseline biodiversity audit of the space prior to planting, with a mini Bioblitz, inviting residents to get involved.

COPSE is a social enterprise set up to engage with other community organisations and landowners to create and enhance community orchards in and around Waverley, Surrey and further afield in the South East.

Community orchards benefit User Groups by:

🍏Providing a focus for community events, activities and training.
🍎Being a vehicle for social cohesion ~ working groups, events and food sharing.
🍏Providing a community resource ~ a place for quiet reflection and casual recreation.
🍎Being a source of locally-grown, seasonal fresh fruit.
🍏Creating traditional orchards for wildlife and increasing biodiversity.

Another key feature of COPSE is that where they plant trees to help fulfill local and regional tree planting targets they do so in a community-centred way ensuring that the trees are cared for and produce fruit that is distributed where it can be best used for community benefit, thus adding to local resilience.

Read COPSE's Summer newsletter here.