This presentation considers how effective public engagement with research can help influence policy to achieve wider societal benefits

1. Public Engagement for Policy
Impact
Mark Reed

2. Plan
• The project
• Public engagement
• Impact
• Learning lessons

3. 1 The Project

4. • £1M RELU/LWEC & ESRC funded project
helping people anticipate and adapt to future
change across UK uplands since 2005
• Almost £1M co-funding from research users
• Interdisciplinary team of 25 people from 5
Universities & 2 NGOs

5. • Analysing environmental case studies across
the UK
• Workshops with KE academics/professionals
• Best practice principles
• Living With Environmental Change
partnership’s Knowledge Exchange Guidelines

6. 2 Public engagement

7. the usual stuff
• Videos on You Tube and DVD
• Newspaper/magazine articles
• Newsletters in visitor centres
• Project websites
• Community meetings
• Schools resources (Summer 2013)

8. • Interactive website social media
– www.ouruplands.co.uk
• Twitter:
– @reluuplands (>2000 followers)
– @sustainlearning (>1000 followers)
– Top twitter tips for academics (>12,000 views on Scribd)

9. social media
Photographers Bird watchers Politicians & Academic
& film-makers political parties institutions
Unions
Land managers Academic individuals
Public sector
individuals
Public sector
...what we tweet about organisations
Journalists &
writers
Media
organisations & NGOs, charities &
publications think-tanks
Business
individuals &
consultants
Businesses & NGO individuals
consultancies
Who our followers are:
Public
Spam

10. arts
• Jazz composition by Huw Warren
• Song and music video by award-winning
photography collective & David Attenbourgh’s sound
recordist
• Fairytale told by storyteller and made into book
• Conceptual art by Dalziel & Scullion (hunting bag)

11. apps
• Suite of smart phone apps for Lake District National
Park & “visitor payback” module for other apps
(coming in summer 2013)
– Learn about the hidden beauty and value of the
landscapes you’re walking through through map-based
text, audio, video & photography
– Invest in the places you love:
• Woodland creation
• Bee corridors
• Peatland restoration
• Footpath repair

12. 3 Impact

13. Impact
• Public engagement resources also influence
policy-makers
– Music video shown to 10,000 people from 153
countries at a congress that got peatlands onto
IUCN’s international work programme
– DEFRA are part funding our app work, so they can
feed lessons into their Payment for Ecosystem
Service Action Plan

14. Impact
• Raising public consciousness about issues you’re
researching can raise those issues up the political
agenda
• Statistics from our research quoted in the Independent
newspaper were quoted in parliament
• Regular media coverage over last 5 years helped keep
political momentum – now funded by DEFRA to draft a UK
Peatland Carbon Code to finance peatland restoration

15. 4 Learning lessons

16. www.lwec.org.uk/ke-guidelines
www.sustainable-learning.org/training

18. www.sustainableuplandresearch.org
Follow on:
@SustainLearning
@reluuplands