A Local Nature Recovery Strategy for West Yorkshire

West Yorkshire supports a wonderful range of landscapes and wildlife, from hills, peat bogs, craggy river valleys and rolling farmland, to nature reserves on old industrial sites, urban parks, allotments and canals. This environment underpins our lives. Nature offers recreation, beauty, physical and mental health benefits as well as providing food, carbon storage, clean air and flood management – all essential services for life on earth.

There has been a huge deterioration in the health of our natural environment. This is due to complex factors that include habitat loss, pesticides, disease, pollution and climate change. In our region, water voles are struggling to survive, hedgehogs are in decline and pockets of species-rich ancient woodland are few and far between.

Photo of two hedgehogs in the grass

Our vision

The Mayor of West Yorkshire, Tracy Brabin, has pledged to tackle the climate and environment emergency. Restoring nature, biodiversity and wildlife habitats is at the heart of that ambition.

We will build a sustainable, nature-rich and climate-ready region that supports businesses and seizes the opportunities of a carbon-free economy, building resilience to the environmental challenges of the future.

Together, we will celebrate, protect and invest in nature, enhancing our rural and urban green spaces, parks, rivers, canals, valleys and moorland and shape the next chapter of our unique West Yorkshire story.

To help reverse decline, and to create a National Nature Recovery Network, a series of Local Nature Recovery Strategies will set out priorities, opportunities and actions to recover biodiversity and achieve wider environmental benefits such as carbon storage, flood control, water quality, health and wellbeing.

We asked for your views via a survey, to help ensure that the Local Nature Recovery Strategy for our region is ambitious, practical and useful. We want to hear what matters to you – for example, what types of nature and green space you enjoy, what nature means to you, what would help you enjoy more nature, more often.

With your help, we will develop a Local Nature Recovery Strategy for West Yorkshire that allows humans and other species to flourish, side by side.

Are you a business based in West Yorkshire?

Do you care about our environment and want to explore how you can contribute to nature recovery in our region? If so, join us to hear about a Local Nature Recovery Strategy for West Yorkshire, share your thoughts and explore opportunities for businesses.

We commissioned Nifty Sustainability CIC to capture the views of businesses, developers, and commercial sector organisations in West Yorkshire. Our survey for businesses closed 11 September 2024 and the business engagement report is available here.

Get in touch

If you, or someone you know, would like a paper copy of the survey, you can ask us via email at yourvoice@westyorks-ca.gov.uk or call MetroLine on 0113 245 7676.

You can write to us via Freepost CONSULTATION TEAM WYCA.

You can also read our FAQs.

If you have a question that's not covered there, you can ask us through our Questions Tool or email us at yourvoice@westyorks-ca.gov.uk.

Inspire us! If you’ve got stories, photos or case studies about supporting nature, wildlife and biodiversity, we’d love to hear what you’ve been up to.

If you'd like to share something please email naturerecovery@westyorks-ca.gov.uk.

Volunteers planting trees