Waitrose & Partners launches £10k fund to support projects that protect the environment

Waitrose & Partners is calling for local organisations and charities to apply for its £10,000 grant fund to support projects that are helping to protect the local environment.

Waitrose & Partners’ Environmental Focus Fund will award money to Channel Island projects that are working to protect the local environment, from reducing plastic and creating sustainable products to nurturing wildlife and nature. The projects can be diverse as long as they can demonstrate that they will benefit and tackle issues impacting Guernsey and Jersey’s environment.

Applications are welcomed from local organisations including charities, community groups, academic bodies, social enterprises and schools across the following project areas:

• Plastics in the community – projects encouraging and enabling plastic reduction and recycling
• Wildlife and nature – projects that work towards preserving local wildlife and plants
• Education – campaigns aimed at local children and young people to raise awareness of protecting the environment 
• Public behaviour change – projects inspiring and enabling new ways of living that reduce individual impact on the environment
• Food, agriculture and farming – projects focusing on finding alternatives and new ways to farm more sustainably and reduce waste

A panel of Waitrose Partners will review the submissions. The chosen projects will be announced in November. £2,500 will be donated to a Guernsey project, £2,500 to a Jersey project and £5,000 to a Channel Islands project.

Paula Protheroe, Branch Manager and Director at Waitrose & Partners, said: “We’re really excited to announce the launch of our Environmental Focus Fund for the Channel Islands.  We hope the donations will make a real difference by inspiring our local community to act and find new ways to reduce our environmental footprint. 

“We’re looking to support projects that can demonstrate how they will make a tangible impact that will have long term benefits for the community. We’d encourage any eligible organisation working in this space to apply. 

“At Waitrose & Partners we take environmental issues very seriously, and are making progress all the time, but we’re determined to maintain our momentum as well as supporting others to do the same.”

The deadline for applications is 30 September 2019.

Waitrose is passionate about reducing its impact on the environment and encourages customers to bring reusable containers to take home products from the supermarket’s fresh service counters with the aim of saving half-a-million plastic bags a year in the Channel Islands.  

The retailer has also replaced loose fruit and vegetable bags with a home compostable alternative and has pledged to make all its own-brand packaging widely-recycled, reusable or home compostable by 2020.