Social Inclusion: Countryside for all

"There are so many priorities for young Muslims, and it is easy for the environment to be overlooked," says Omer Williams, project co-ordinator at the Black Environment Network. The group, based in Snowdonia, is working to change the perception that the environment is something only White, middle-class people think about.

One of its projects is Swansea-based Third World Ethnic Environmental Participation, which helps young people from ethnic minorities to understand the environment in a way that is relevant to their lives.

"If someone is to care about the environment, they have to see it and understand it," explains Williams. Third World Ethnic Environmental Participation (see box) has now set up Welsh Environment Link Creating Opportunities for Muslim Engagement, an environmental volunteering group grounded in the Islamic faith. The group is thinking small and local, carrying out inexpensive projects like cleaning up beaches and cutting back overgrown canal towpaths, all within travelling distance of Swansea.

Masood, a 20-year-old volunteer with the group, says: "I suppose I was sympathetic to environmental causes already, but when you have the opportunity to put that into practice, it becomes a conviction. From a religious point of view, the Prophet said we should look after the earth and it's important for me to make the world a better place for the future."

A world away

Anne Du Chemin, community access officer at The National Trust, says projects are needed to encourage Black and minority ethnic (BME) young people into the countryside. "There are many young people for whom the countryside just isn't part of their lives: if you spend most of your time in a town it can seem quite boring in comparison," she says. "You have to find someone's purpose for visiting the countryside."

Nineteen-year-old Nita from Bedford agrees. "I wouldn't go into the countryside if it was just sheep because that could be boring," she says. "But if I had my own car, and could go walking, then get back in my car, I'd like that. I do like walking in woods though, you see people doing family things there."

The Black Environment Network and its projects are particularly welcome because young people from a BME background are often perceived to be indifferent to the rural environment. The Countryside Agency produced a report, Capturing Richness, that found people of all ages from ethnic minority backgrounds felt they didn't have the right to visit the countryside. But when young people did visit, they often enjoyed it. Young refugees in particular felt reconnected with their homeland: a young Somali asylum seeker declared a day in the Brecon Beacons "the best day in her life", while for a group of Afghani young men, the sight of hills, waterfalls and grazing flocks gave rise to thoughts of home. "This is like paradise," they said.

The Mosaic pilot project was set up in 2001 by the Black Environment Network and the Council for National Parks, to encourage more BME people of all ages to use the countryside.

A new Mosaic partnership with a wider scope and more organisational partners will be launched in the Peak District in October. The majority of the funding for the £1m project comes from the Heritage Lottery Fund, which has provided a grant of £635,000 over three-and-a-half years. The remaining funding is from various national parks, The Countryside Agency, Nationwide Building Society and Lloyds TSB Foundation.

Easy access

At this stage, Mosaic is focusing on the communities within easy reach of four national parks: the Yorkshire Dales, the Peak District, North York Moors and the Brecon Beacons. The Black Environment Network provided awareness training for national park staff.

Many Mosaic projects take an intergenerational approach that recognises the importance of extended families. Junie Joseph, Mosaic project officer at the Council for National Parks, says: "This can be very successful, providing there are activities for young people, so they have the opportunity to break away from the main group." She explains: "Community leaders come on our familiarisation visits and they realise that youth hostels are very approachable. It's OK to make their needs known and say they want halal food, or arrange for a corridor to be set aside for young women."

One perceived barrier to BME young people enjoying the countryside is the fact that ethnic minority communities tend to be concentrated in urban areas. Trevor Phillips, chairman of the Commission for Racial Equality, has said that a form of "passive apartheid" exists in the British countryside, which, he believes, is seen as a no-go area for ethnic minorities. Seventeen-year-old Libni, from Bedford, does not agree. "I wouldn't say the countryside is more racist - I've never had anything happen," she says. "I like the countryside and think of it as somewhere peaceful."

Wilfred Emmanuel-Jones, who claims to be Britain's only Black farmer, also rejects the notion of racist rural Britain. "The reality is that young people will stand out, but because someone's staring doesn't mean they're racist," he says. "Yes, there are things that are not quite politically correct: people in the countryside still use the word 'coloured' for example, because they think it's more polite."

Life on the farm

Emmanuel-Jones wants to show that the countryside is not a no-go area for Black people and is putting £40,000 of his own money into a Black youth scholarship. He will select eight young men and women from the 200-plus applicants for the first intake to live on his farm in Devon, learning about farming and all aspects of rural life. At the end of the apprenticeship, Emmanuel-Jones will employ two of the trainees, while the others will be helped to find work in farming. A youth worker will support the 17- to 20-year-olds throughout their training and a Channel 4 documentary team will be filming their progress.

"Farming is going through massive change, and where there is change, there is opportunity," says Emmanuel-Jones. As well as learning to value the land for the living it can yield, he hopes that his apprentices will learn to become more self-reliant. "Farming is quite disciplined," he says. "You can't be a selfish farmer, because if you don't care for your animals they will die."

The barriers are coming down in many areas, but Emmanuel-Jones and Williams say that young people from ethnic minorities need more positive role models.

This sentiment is echoed by Pammy Johal, one of only three Black outdoor educators in the UK.

"I want young people to get the opportunity to find out where the environment belongs in their world," says Johal, founder of the Backbone international outdoor education project. "I really want them to experience the outdoors, and I love the spirit of a group of Black women climbing together. The outdoors made me who I am."

A break from the city

The Black Environment Network's Swansea-based Third World Ethnic Environmental Participation project gives young people from the city access to the countryside and national parks close to Swansea. Volunteers can take part in environmental projects such as beach clean-ups and woodland management, or get training in organising countryside visits themselves (see pictures, left). Project co-ordinator Omer Williams says: "I try to identify people who have that leadership quality and help them bring that out." The principle behind the project is the belief that one-off countryside visits are not enough to change how young people from ethnic minorities access wild places.

"There's no point taking someone horseriding if they're never going to have the chance again," says Williams. "A one-off visit might have a really strong impact on one or two individuals, but there has to be a level of shared experience and acquired memories before most people feel confident enough to go camping or whatever, without any organisation from us. This project is about giving people the chance to experience everything that's positive about the countryside without treating them like a charity case."

YOUNG PEOPLE'S VOICES

How people treat you in the countryside depends on how you behave. If we have respect, they can't say 'what are you doing here?' - Abu, 19, Bedford

People in the countryside might expect us to be yobbish, but their opinion wouldn't stop me from living there - Nita, 19, Bedford

I would go into the countryside more if I could, but it's expensive. You have to pay for travel, activities and accommodation - Libni, 17, Bedford.