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John Muir Award Impact Report 2025: Celebrating wins for wild places

The John Muir Award Impact Report 2025 (published June 2026) reports the first year after the Award's relaunch in March 2025. 2,919 participants completed the Award, collectively spending 32,399 hours on conservation activities to protect and restore natural processes, including planting 1,736 trees and 219 shrubs and creating 674 homes for wildlife. Award activity took place in all four UK nations and the Channel Islands, with groups from state, special and independent schools, outdoor education centres, youth work, community and conservation groups and families.

Report snapshot
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About

The John Muir Trust is dedicated to protecting, restoring and championing the UK's wild places, now and for the future. The John Muir Award is its engagement initiative, encouraging people of all backgrounds to connect with, enjoy and care for wild places through four challenges: discover, explore, conserve and share. The Trust is a Scottish charitable company (Charity No. SC002061).

Key Metrics

2,919 participants completed the John Muir Award in 2025
32,399 hours of conservation activity
1,736 trees planted by Award participants

Key Outcomes

  • 674 homes for wildlife and 771 wildlife feeders provided by participants
  • 219 shrubs planted as part of conservation activity
  • Groups completed the Award in Scotland (73), England (44), Northern Ireland (5), Wales (2) and the Channel Islands (2)

Geography

UK-Wide

Impact Snapshot
Key Metric 1
5,999 active volunteers contributed 776,242 hours in 2025/26
Key Metric 2
137 winter maintenance projects across 45 canals; 109 lock gates replaced
Key Metric 3
101,640 children participated in Explorers/STEM outdoor learning, including 67,896 water-safety participants
Over 80% of the network kept fully open despite drought.
Impact Snapshot
Key Metric 1
The Eco-Schools programme reached over 1.4 million pupils, with 2,162 schools awarded the Eco-Schools Green Flag in 2024/25
Key Metric 2
326,000 volunteers pledged to the Great British Spring Clean, picking up 425,626 bags of rubbish, supported by 288 local authorities and parish councils
Key Metric 3
2,227 Green Flag Awards given to parks and green spaces in the UK; 151 beaches given a Blue Flag and/or Seaside Award
98.3% of educators felt the Eco-Schools programme significantly supports young people's development of 'green skills'
Impact Snapshot
Key Metric 1
First known breeding success of spoonbills in the Norfolk Broads in around 400 years, recorded at Hickling Broads and Marshes
Key Metric 2
Over 60 nature reserves managed across Norfolk, with land owned or managed for wildlife exceeding 5,000 hectares
Key Metric 3
1,500 volunteers helped protect wildlife across the county during the year
New urban nature reserve co-designed with the local community, expanding accessible green space in Norfolk
Impact Snapshot
Key Metric 1
61,819 native oysters deployed across UK restoration projects in 2024/25
Key Metric 2
15,064 people participated in the Beachwatch beach clean programme, submitting 1,256 litter surveys — the highest in the programme's 31-year history
Key Metric 3
17,613 young people engaged through in-person or online youth programme sessions
£11.5 billion Ofwat investment package secured for storm overflow cuts in England and Wales following sustained MCS advocacy