New Environmental Horticulture Group launching
The EHG aims to champion UK environmental horticulture and arboriculture affairs
The Environmental Horticulture Group (EHG) will be launching today at the House of Lords, Westminster. The UK’s gardening, landscaping, arboriculture and environmental horticulture sectors will be coming together to relaunch the industry group, formerly known as the Ornamental Horticulture Roundtable Group, with the intention to champion sectoral affairs within government.
The parliamentary reception will be hosted by the All-Party Parliamentary Gardening & Horticulture Group, a cross-party group of MPs and Peers who support the environmental horticulture industry.
The group says it will be applying substantial pressure to the government to do more in the way of support for the sector, enabling it to reach its full potential. In research conducted by Oxford Economics, it was found that the environmental horticulture industry could grow to support GDP contributions worth £41.8bn and provide 763,000 jobs by 2030, if given the proper parliamentary support.
Boyd Douglas-Davies, chair of the EHG, says: “Caring for and improving the environment – be that through private gardens, urban green spaces or public parks – goes to the heart of what the Environmental Horticulture Group stands for.
“I was honoured to chair the OHRG and now I am delighted to chair the EHG as we continue to champion the enormous success and exciting potential of the environmental horticulture sector. I look forward to working closely with government stakeholders to achieve our shared aims in a breadth of policy areas including economic, environmental, science, research, net zero, business, health, planning, taxation, skills and education.
“The time is now if we are to make the most of the next decade of growth opportunities and work with government to create a truly greener, happier, more environmentally sustainable society and economy.”
Increased greenery in urban areas, improved environmental sustainability and facilitating a stronger seasonal worker scheme are some of the key issues important to the wider environmental horticulture sector that the EHG will be campaigning on.
The EHG includes garden centres and their supply-chain, public and private gardens, commercial growers and nurseries, arboriculture, and domestic and commercial landscaping. Its core members are the Arboriculture Association (AA), British Association of Landscape Industries, Horticultural Trades Association (HTA) and the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS).
