Recorded Wednesday 20 January 2021 as part of the Active Environmentalism series of online talks and exhibitions at Messums Wiltshire. Introduced by Johnny Messum.

Ben Goldsmith, who owns a 300-acre farm, near Bruton in Somerset, plans  to transform it into a wild habitat within the next four years.  He says, “We want to achieve the kind of species-rich, shape-shifting  scrubby wood pasture environment that once blanketed much of western  Britain.”  Working with a wildlife ecologist, Ben has encouraged wetlands along the  River Frome, wild flowers and native species including water voles,  beavers and glow-worms – which used to be a feature of long summer  evenings.  

Ben Goldsmith is chair of the Conservative Environmental Network and is  on the Board of DEFRA. Ben chairs the Goldsmith family’s philanthropic  foundation, the JMG Foundation, which has a focus on the environment.  Ben is also a Trustee of one of the UK’s largest philanthropic  foundations, the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation. In 2003 Ben  co-founded the UK Environmental Funders’ Network.