Charity to provide children from deprived areas chance to learn about farming and countryside

Disadvantaged children get farm visits boost thanks to landowners
Disadvantaged children get farm visits boost thanks to landowners

A national educational charity providing children from deprived areas with a chance to learn more about food, farming and the countryside has been awarded a grant from the CLA Charitable Trust to help further its work in Staffordshire.

The Country Trust works with primary schools in urban and other areas of high deprivation bringing the working countryside alive for around 25,000 children every year, and has been given a £2,850 donation from the landowners’ charity to extend the reach of its work in Stoke.

"We take children out to real working farms to meet the farmer, to learn where food comes from"
"We take children out to real working farms to meet the farmer, to learn where food comes from"

Claire Marmion, fundraising manager for The Country Trust, said: “We help disadvantaged children to learn and grow through day visits to real working farms, residential visits to the countryside, and yearlong programmes exploring every aspect of growing, cooking and even selling food. One of those, the Farm Discovery programme, is at the heart of everything we do and is what the CLA’s grant will help with.

“We take children out to real working farms to meet the farmer, learn where food comes from, see farm animals up close, learn about the machinery and technology on a farm, have a go at activities such as grinding wheat and to enjoy open spaces.

Children will learn about how food grows
Children will learn about how food grows

“A lot of these children come along from areas or schools where they don’t have any green space and their parents don’t always have the means to take them on trips out.

“Our Farm Discovery visits really inspire their imagination. Their confidence increases, they experience a sense of freedom perhaps for the first time, and they have a renewed interest in the world around them. With new vocabulary and a new enthusiasm for learning, many will do better in the classroom too.

“It’s also important that the children get the chance to be children. Very often their favourite part of the day is just running in fields and meadows, because they don’t get the opportunity to do that if they live in a busy urban area or in a tower block.

“We are getting more and more demand for our work in deprived urban areas. Financial help such as this from the CLA will help us to expand our programme in Stoke and the number of farm hosts we work with.”

The Country Trust, established in 1978, is based in Chelmsford, Essex, but has hundreds of volunteer farmers and landowners from all across England and Wales welcoming 25,000 disadvantaged young children from all backgrounds and faiths onto their farms each year.