Environment & Climate 2025
National Trust

Annual Report 2024-2025

The National Trust is Europe's largest conservation charity, protecting historic places and natural landscapes across England, Wales and Northern Ireland. In 2024-25, 25.9 million visits were made to Trust properties (up from 25.3m); membership stood at 5.35 million individuals; total conservation spend on property projects and acquisitions was £221.2m (up from £193.4m); and appeals, gifts and grants reached record levels. A new 10-year strategy, People and Nature Thriving, was launched in January 2025, committing to create 250,000 hectares of nature-rich landscape over the next decade.

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📋About

Protection and conservation of historic buildings (330 houses, 200 gardens, 41 castles, 47 industrial monuments, 140 hillforts); countryside and coastline management; nature restoration (Riverlands, peatland, rewilding, tree planting); visitor experiences and access; Heritage Open Days; Blossom Festival (urban access to nature); outreach and urban places programmes; volunteer programme; apprenticeships (conservation, gardening, stone masonry, joinery); membership scheme; Discovery Houses programme Custom geography from upload: England, Wales and Northern Ireland

📊Key Metrics

25.9 million visits to Trust properties in 2024-25 (up from 25.3m in 2023-24); 5.35 million individual members (2.61 million memberships) Key Metric 1
£221.2m total spend on property projects and acquisitions (up from £193.4m); £7.3m invested at Sandilands to convert 30-hectare former golf course into wetland nature reserve Key Metric 2
Record fundraising appeals, gifts and grants in 2024-25; 5% increase in paying visitor numbers; 896 miles of coastline and ~250,000 hectares of land protected Key Metric 3

✅Key Outcomes

  • New 10-year strategy People and Nature Thriving launched January 2025; RHS Chelsea Flower Show Octavia Hill Garden won Silver Gilt Medal, Children's Choice and People's Choice awards; partnership with Defra, English Community Forests and Woodland Trust to plant 2 million trees on Trust land over 5 years
  • Borrowdale rainforest designated King's Series National Nature Reserve; £18m Bath Assembly Rooms conservation and visitor experience project approved; 49 Sycamore Gap Trees of Hope saplings to be gifted across UK; major infrastructure projects approved at Shugborough, Saltram and Trelissick
  • 130th anniversary year; ranked 46th in Financial Times UK Best Employers 2025; Board expanded to 13 Trustees with new non-voting Trustee apprentice role; 70,000 people consulted over 18 months to shape new strategy; 25% carbon emissions reduction since 2019/20

📍Geography

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