Countryside Code: Coronavirus

(asked on 2nd February 2021) - View Source

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether he plans to update the Countryside Code after covid-19 restrictions have been lifted and The Countryside Code - short Covid-19 online version, last updated on 2 July 2020, has been stood down.


Answered by
Rebecca Pow Portrait
Rebecca Pow
This question was answered on 10th February 2021

Natural England (NE) has a statutory duty to produce and promote the Countryside Code which provides three levels of information: short and long versions for the public plus additional information for land managers and owners for areas of open country. NE is currently undertaking a review and refresh of the Code.

The launch of the refreshed version of the Countryside Code at Easter will be the first step in a much longer campaign both to promote the Code and begin an associated campaign running throughout 2021. This will include a broader conversation with stakeholders about what a ‘post-Covid’ Code for the 21st century would look like and how we can, as a sector, promote more positive behaviours and awareness. The aim is that it can be used flexibly across multiple platforms to reach a much greater diversity of audiences and NE will be setting out more about this work in due course.

Alongside this development work an updated video has been produced to promote the Code and respecting the countryside. This has been posted across Defra’s and Natural England’s social media channels as well as being available to stakeholders to use on their social channels with a complementary package of additional content. We also plan to publicise the video on the Government’s ‘Nextdoor’ channel and on our Instagram accounts this week.

We are continuing to work on a wider communications plan and will be developing additional social media content to respond to potential upcoming issues over the coming months.

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