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2010/11
Annual Report
36,123 Trees
10,323 Volunteers
42 Projects Worldwide
Trees for Cities
Trees for CitiesTrees for Cities breathes life into your neighbourhood and inspires people to plant and love trees in cities worldwide.
We manage projects across the UK and Ireland as well as internationally in Addis Ababa, Nairobi and Ica. Community-led design is an integral part of our landscaping projects. Involving local residents, schools and community groups helps to ensure the sustainability of these green spaces.
Contents
TrusteesGraham Simmonds, ChairJulian Blake Jane Bruton Jake Kempston Martin Simmonds Belinda Winder
1 Chief Executive’s overview2 A fruitful partnership4 A new vocation6 Trees for life8 Warm welcome in Coldharbour10 New life in city graveyard12 Londoners Love Trees14 Supporters16 Finance report18 How you can help
PatronsLeslie Bacon Melvin BennDame Hilary BlumeJeremy CollerSir John Egan Neil Fox Diarmuid GavinLeo HambroRichard Hammond
Simon JenkinsAlistair McGowanJamie OliverRichard RogersLord Sheppard of DidgemereJon SnowSophie Warre
Front cover image: street tree on Birling Road, London
Chief Executive’s overview
Shar
on Jo
hnso
n
1
This year has seen Trees for Cities go from strength to strength, so it’s with pleasure that I introduce our 2010/11 Annual Report. Having planted our 100,000th tree back in 2008, I am delighted to report that we have now planted over 200,000 trees and we will plant a further 200,000 trees over the next four years.
We have worked extremely hard this year to develop our activities and increase our geographical spread whilst ensuring we remain financially robust. I would like to thank all our supporters, volunteers and Patrons for helping us achieve this.
People continue to be at the heart of what we do and this year has been no exception – whether it is training a new generation of gardeners and arborists to look after our trees and green spaces; working with an expanding number of schools to teach children about growing food through our edible playground programme, or encouraging more people to volunteer. This year, our volunteers helped us to plant 10,000 trees in just one week. Looking forward, we have developed some fantastic partnerships which, together with your continuing support, will help us deliver so much more. Whether it’s through DEFRA’s Big Tree Plant where we will work with local people to plant 27,000 trees across 11 England cities; Kia enabling us to continue our street tree programme over the next 3 years; or our Tree the World programme with Bloomberg, our projects will continue to help those most in need.
Sharon JohnsonChief Executive, Trees for Cities
In March the partnership between Trees for Cities and Velvet turned a run-down walled garden in Birmingham into the winner of a national competition.
The project is a model of urban orchard creation – transforming a dumping area for traffic cones and shopping trolleys into a vibrant, fruitful community space.
The competition was organised by Velvet as part of their Campaign for Trees, with people up and down the country going online to vote for the areas they felt could benefit from more trees. Birmingham received the most votes and Velvet donated £20,000 to Trees for Cities to fund the renovation.
Scrap metal from the site was reclaimed and recycled, and dumped tyres were used to create raised beds for soft fruits. The orchard is now publicly accessible and includes benches, community composting facilities and juice presses.
Planting included heritage fruit varieties and in particular Perry pears, which have left their mark on local place names such as Perry Barr and Perry Common, but no longer grow in the area.
The orchard was officially opened by Big Brother star Alison Hammond in May. Birmingham-born Alison said: “It’s fantastic to see the community spirit and to see something sustainable; the children that have planted trees here will come back and see them grow.”
In 2011/12 through its leading edible playgrounds and urban orchards programme, Trees for Cities will develop its work with communities to champion the importance of locally grown food.
A fruitful partnership
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Clockwise from top left: before planting; after planting; official opening with Big Brother star Alison Hammond
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Clockwise from top left: Westferry estate planting; residents at the planting day; Robyn Stone, trainee
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A new vocation
Trees for Cities trained over 50 people in 2010/11 on its horticultural and arboricultural courses. One trainee, Robyn Stone, signed up for the diploma in Horticulture and gives her own account of how Trees for Cities helped to transform her career:
“I'd attended parties held for fundraising for Trees for Cities and decided to take a look at the website to see if they offered any volunteer work. I then realised that training was also on offer.
As a trainee, I was involved in planting various species of trees, from saplings to bigger types. This entailed all aspects of maintenance of the trees for a period of up to three years. I also helped with soft landscaping at two London schools and on three estates, as well as generally looking after plants, planting from seeds and cuttings, pruning, weeding and identifying stock as and when it came in.
My favourite experience was working at Rotherfield Primary School in Islington. It was very satisfying to see the produce the children were going to benefit from and what they learned along the way.
At Westferry Housing Estate, I enjoyed ground preparation most of all - it's very satisfying to know that this is the start of how it will all eventually come together. Trees for Cities has transformed the space into a much nicer, greener place. It was quite bare and empty before. It's now user-friendly and will hopefully encourage people to not only utilise the spaces but also to look after the plants.
I now work as a full-time gardener for Quadron and help with all aspects of the upkeep of the Geraldine Mary Harmsworth Park.”
In 2011 Trees for Cities will train six more women apprentices in horticultural skills whilst working on heritage landscapes with funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund.
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Trees for life
The Alendu School serves an impoverished community on the outskirts of Kisumu, with over 600 children attending the school.Supported by Festival Republic, Trees for Cities has worked with local project partners to create a sustainable forest farm and orchard on the school grounds.
Trees for Cities provided the school with 4,366 fruit, boundary and shade trees during Kenya’s rainy season last year. George Onyango, Project Officer of local project partner the Omega Foundation, gives an account of how the project has helped to transform the school and community:
“As anticipated, drought has been a major challenge; however the pupils of Alendu have made tremendous efforts in watering the plants and trees to help ensure their survival. During the school holidays casual labourers have contributed by watering and weeding the trees and plants.
Pupils said that they enjoyed mulching, watering and seeing their vegetables and tomatoes germinating well. They are looking forward to expanding their cultivation and growing within their school compound. They want to grow maize on a larger piece of land to supply their school and the community with grain.
The favourite part of the garden for the pupils is where the tomatoes are grown. The children also look forward to having the trees as shade where they can read and play during break time. Any produce not consumed by pupils will be sold to fund a new school dinner programme.”
With support from Bloomberg for our Tree the World initiative, in 2011/12 Trees for Cities will develop new international projects in cities such as Kigali (Rwanda), Ica (Peru) and Nairobi (Kenya).
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Images from top: a mango tree (Magifera Indica), photo by mauroguanandi: preparing the school grounds for planting; pupils from Alendu School amongst the crops.
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Images from top: a mango tree (Magifera Indica), photo by mauroguanandi: preparing the school grounds for planting; pupils from Alendu School amongst the crops.
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8 Trees for Cities’ Arboriculture trainees and students of Rotherfield School
A newly planted tree outside the Opus cafe, Acre Lane
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One of Trees for Cities’ driving forces is a commitment to raising awareness of the importance of street trees. Street trees can transform a local landscape, adding colour and texture throughout the year, providing new habitats for wildlife and improving the streetscape for all.
In 2010/11 Trees for Cities successfully planted over 285 street trees. Research shows that street trees in urban areas can help to reduce crime, improve health and mitigate climate change.
One of Trees for Cities major street tree projects in 2011 was the planting of 175 new trees in the Coldharbour neighbourhood in London. The project was highly successful and part of the Mayor of London Boris Johnson’s street tree programme which seeks to ensure that there is one tree for every London resident.
Phillipe Castaing was one of the 436 Brixton residents who were consulted over the project. Phillipe runs the Opus café on Acre Lane and was instrumental in securing a location for a tree outside his café. He described his experience:
“Trees are good and they are the best thing that we can have on our streets. I am watering the tree that was planted outside my cafe and also another newly planted tree nearby. I have under planted the tree pits with grasses, herbs and recycled unwanted plants.
There were not many trees there before. Now the street is nicer and my customers have said they like it; I have only had positive comments.”
In 2011/12, Trees for Cities continues to champion street tree planting: Trees for Cities’ Future Great Trees project in partnership with The Dorchester celebrates the hotel’s 80th anniversary by planting long living, heritage or majestic trees, in and around London.
Warm welcome in Coldharbour
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In 2010/11 Trees for Cities worked with 690 corporate volunteers through our Corporate Challenge Days. Many of our dedicated supporters talk about the positive experience of being able to put something back into the community. Lech Mintowt-Czyz, News Editor for The Times, sent us his account of his day as a volunteer:
“I helped out for the day at an overgrown graveyard at St Leonard’s Priory in east London. It might have been overgrown but it had certainly not been abandoned – the site had become a haunt for gangs and drug addicts. Any doubt as to the habits of its users disappeared when one of our volunteers found a working handgun in the bushes. We called the police to take it away.
With a bit of help from me and my colleagues from The Times and News International, Trees for Cities has now transformed the site into a place where no drug addict or gang member would be comfortable. It is open, it is green and it is pretty.
As it turned out, I was the only person from my department present that day and I was pitched in with 30-or-so people I had never met before from a different side of the business completely. One member of editorial (me) and a few dozen eager young things from marketing. We didn’t talk shop much, but what little was said opened my eyes to aspects of our company that I had been blind to – a lack of knowledge that, I now realise, was a disadvantage both to me and the company.
It has taken several days of hard work from volunteers to get the site into shape, but as physically demanding as that work might have been, my day sharing in it was very enjoyable indeed.”
Trees for Cities relies on the help of our individual and corporate volunteers to deliver our projects. In 2011/12 a new project Londoners Love Trees will see thousands of new volunteering opportunities.
New life in city graveyard
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Clockwise from top left: volunteers at St Leonard’s Priory; the gun discovered in the bushes;
volunteers working in the graveyard
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Get involvedWe are very proud to be leading an exciting new London-wide initiative Londoners Love Trees. The project will see 4,000 tree loving volunteer opportunities created and 9,000 new trees planted in London. Londoners Love Trees is delivered in partnership with the Forestry Commission, the Greater London Authority, The Tree Council, the London Tree Officers Association and Barchams Trees and is supported by Team London, the Mayor of London and the Reuben Foundation.
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Clockwise from top left: Boris Johnson, Mayor of London, volunteers and Sharon Johnson, Chief Executive of Trees for Cities at our largest
project (10,000 trees in one week); the child and parent planting day at Manorfield Primary School; a volunteer at Westferry Estate; volunteers
in the garden at Trees for Cities head office.
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Major supporters
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Supporters
Alan Evans Memorial TrustAsperityBarclaysBelvedereBig Green CoachCapital FM Help a Capital ChildCapital GrowthChislehurst & Sidcup SchoolCrawcoCredit SuisseCubitt Town SchoolDiageoEconomistEcopacEdenRed (Accor Services)Firmdale HotelsGallions Housing AssociationGrant Thornton Griffon Land & Estates LtdHoly Family SchoolHSBCIgniteIngeusInturn Trading
Lloyds TSBLondon Borough of BromleyMitsuiNative UniversitiesNicholas Bacon Charitable TrustOcean EstatesPorticoPriceWaterhouseCoopersRestaurant AssociatesSalon SuccessSelfStewed!The Friends of Clapham CommonThe Gunter Charitable TrustThe Tree CouncilTotal Office & PartnersViridorVisionWarner BrosWarren EvansWiproWorking LinksYMCA
With thanks to Tom Aikens, Jo Brand, Tom Chapman & Ruth Chapman, Lily Cole, Chris Collins, Sam Galsworthy, Ben Fogle, Susie Johns and Christopher Barr, Olivia Kay, Tony Kirkham, Yamit Mamo, Gillian and Laurie Marsh, Shazia Mirza, Graham Norton, Michael Norton, Amber Nuttall, David Osman, Katherine Poulton, Gaby Roslin, Scissor Sisters, Kate Smurthwaite, Liam Speirs and Tales of the Unexpected for their support for Trees for Cities.
RodiRodin
16
Finance Report
Resources expended
Costs of generating funds 193,686 - 5,531 199,217 232,174
Charitable activitiesCommunity greening projects : - London- Other UK cities- InternationalVocational trainingCampaigning and awareness
50,233784325
1,2628,600
-----
689,368154,861
64,145256,321
-
739,601155,645
64,470257,583
8,600
809,207147,708
60,463162,741
71,657
Total charitable expenditure 61,204 - 1,164,695 1,225,899 1,251,776
Governance costs 52,181 - - 52,181 35,537
Total resources expended 307,071 - 1,170,226 1,477,297 1,519,487
Net incoming (outgoing) resources before transfersImpairment of investmentsTransfers
(26,407)
-39,522
36,022
-(39,522)
(1,063)
--
8,552
--
(14,914)
(4,900)-
Net income for the year/Net movement in funds 13,115 (3,500) (1,063) 8,552 (19,814)
Fund balances at 1 April 2010 466,266 72,000 1,063 539,329 559,143
Fund balances at 31 March 2011
479,381 68,500 - 547,881 539,329
Unrestricted funds £
Designated funds £
Restricted funds £
Total 2011£
Total 2010£
Incoming resources
Incoming resources from generated funds
Voluntary Income - DonationsActivities for generating fundsInvestment income - interest receivable
73,608134,741
195
208,544
---
40,891276,772
-
317,663
114,499411,513
195
526,207
127,287357,395
3,315
487,997
Incoming resources from charitable activities
Community greening projects : - London- Other UK cities- InternationalVocational trainingCampaigning and awareness
69,501-
2,619-
36,022----
527,24728,83631,990
263,427-
632,77028,83634,609
263,427-
742,26985,73917,664
154,58916,315
Total incoming resources 280,664 36,022 1,169,163 1,485,849 1,504,573
Statement of Financial Activities for the year ended 31 March 2011
16
RodiRodin
17
Trusts and foundations34%
Businesses 37%
Central government 4.5%
Individuals 5%
Local government 19%
Lottery funding 0.5% Bankers:
The Co-operative Bank P.O. Box 250 Delf HouseSkelmersdale WN8 6WT
Northern RockNorthern Rock HouseP.O. Box No 2 GosforthNewcastle-upon-Tyne NE3 4PL
Registered Auditors: Russell New LimitedThe CourtyardShoreham RoadUpper Beeding, SteyningWest Sussex BN44 3TN
These summarised accounts have been extracted from the full audited accounts. For a copy of the full accounts, the auditors’ report on those accounts and the Trustees’ Annual Report, please contact Finance Director, Andrew Collins at [email protected] 020 7820 4425.
2011 2010
£ £ £ £
Fixed assets
Tangible assetsInvestments
Current assetsStocksDebtorsCash at bank and in hand
Creditors: amounts falling due within one year
Net current assets
Total assets less current liabilities
Income fundsRestricted fundsUnrestricted funds: Designated fundsOther charitable fundsUnrestricted income funds
781399,182416,370
816,333
(282,228)
13,676100
13,776
534,105
547,881
-68,500
479,381547,881
781412,134214,123
627,038
(95,065)
7,256100
7,356
531,973
539,329
1,06372,000
466,266539,329
Balance sheet at 31 March 2011
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How you can helpMake a donationDonate to us and join thousands of others in providing vital ongoing support to change the urban environment. Trees for Cities also holds regular online auctions.
VolunteerCome and dig at our community planting days or get colleagues involved with a Corporate Challenge Day.
Sponsor a projectGet your company involved in one of our projects or donate items for our fundraising auctions.
Attend an eventJoin us at one of our fundraising parties or organise a party of your own.
Call Trees for Cities on 020 7587 1320 or email [email protected] for more information on how you can get involved.
Trees for CitiesCharity registration number 1032154Prince Consort LodgeKennington ParkKennington Park PlaceLondonSE11 4AS
Tel: +44 (0)20 7587 1320Fax: +44 (0)20 7793 9042Email: [email protected]
How you can helpMake a donationDonate to us and join thousands of others in providing vital ongoing support to change the urban environment. Trees for Cities also holds regular online auctions. You can also find tree gifts on our webshop.
VolunteerCome and dig at our community planting days or get colleagues involved with a Corporate Challenge Day.
Sponsor a projectGet your company involved in one of our projects or donate items for our fundraising auctions.
Attend an eventTake part in a sponsored running event, join us at one of our fundraising parties or organise a party of your own.
Call Trees for Cities on 020 7587 1320 or email [email protected] for more information on how you can get involved.
Trees for CitiesCharity registration number 1032154Prince Consort LodgeKennington ParkKennington Park PlaceLondonSE11 4AS
Tel: +44 (0)20 7587 1320Fax: +44 (0)20 7793 9042Email: [email protected]
