Lessons from the Land+ Work
The Land+ project has explored a different way of working with communities around land use and local decision-making.
Through the micro-pilot and wider collaboration across the NW2045 area, the project has generated valuable insights into what helps, and what can hinder, genuine collaboration between communities, landowners and organisations.
The lessons below reflect the experience gained through this work and highlight key factors that help build trust, strengthen connections, and support meaningful change within communities of place.
Key Lessons from the Land+ Work
- Time, patience, persistence and energy are required to deal with a multi-faceted, complex reality.
- It is beneficial to work directly with people who are of/from the community, who have energy, enthusiasm, ‘bandwidth’, tenacity and investment in the future of the place, and people who are respected within the community.
- Diversity within the team – intergenerational and cross-sectoral – is important.
- Remunerate these people for their time, wherever possible, is important – to avoid volunteer fatigue and elite capture.
- Ensure the children and young people are involved: they are the future.
- Foster genuine, mutual trust and respect within and beyond the project team.
- Ensure people know they are listened to, have a voice and agency, and are connected: this engenders a sense of empowerment, which can catalyse change.
- Being present in the community – able to attend meetings of the Community Council and other bodies – fosters connections more organically.
- This ‘soft presence’ helps build trusting relationships, reaching beyond the ‘usual suspects’ to lesser heard voices, and building a holistic picture of the community’s views and concerns.
- Personal connections help people to share knowledge: often this knowledge is all that is needed to stimulate and enable change to happen.
- Technical vocabulary does not enthuse people: it is important to use accessible language and focus on clear, practical concepts.
- External ‘experts’ must communicate clearly and be careful to involve people meaningfully and respectfully.
- These external advisors / experts must learn from working within a community.
- Abstract concepts – climate and nature crises, and natural capital – do not resonate with people, especially when they have more urgent, tangible challenges in their daily life.
- Therefore – encourage people to be involved via relatable ‘hooks’ that are relevant to their life and immediate concerns.
- This groundwork builds resilience and connections to equip the community of place for future challenges.
- There is no ‘quick win’ when it comes to Natural Capital projects, but an RLUP can help make concepts more accessible and support communities of place to understand the opportunities, and potential trade-offs.
- For all partners to have the confidence to commit to a long-term project requires certainty and stability in many variables: both external factors (including agricultural subsidies), and all relationships pertaining to the land.
- We continue participate in wider knowledge sharing initiatives within Scotland.
Working Within the Community
A central lesson from the Land+ work is the importance of working within communities rather than around them.
Building trust, relationships and shared understanding takes time. However, this investment creates stronger foundations for collaboration and enables people with different roles and perspectives to work together more effectively.
By supporting open conversations and encouraging people to share knowledge and experience, communities can identify opportunities, address challenges and shape decisions that affect the future of their land and livelihoods.
What’s Next for NW2045 RLUP
Regional Land Use Partnerships across Scotland are now moving beyond their pilot phase and becoming a more formal national initiative.
Meanwhile, the Land+ work is moving ahead, based on the experiences of all the work so far. From January to March 2026, the NW2045 RLUP has undertaken a ‘Land+ Snapshot’ process across the whole area to understand what people think about land use in the area: what are the challenges and opportunities? Read more about the work here.
On 25th March, the NW2045 RLUP is holding the first RLUP Gathering in Elphin.
