Leaders from across brands, agencies and media owners gathered last week to launch the ‘Media in Service of Nature’ movement, a collective commitment for the industry to dedicate a small percentage of campaign spend to UK nature recovery.
Co-founded by climate action platform Ecologi, alongside giffgaff and MG OMD, the event took place ahead of Earth Day on 22 April and was titled ‘Boardroom in Nature’, looking to bring the conversation out of the traditional boardroom set-up and into environments that the initiative is designed to support.
The initiative believes that if media and advertising budgets can shape culture, drive growth and influence behaviour, they can also help fund the restoration of the natural world.
As part of the movement, brands are encouraged to commit a minimum of 0.1% of their campaign spend to Ecologi’s verified UK nature recovery projects, helping build climate resilience, restore biodiversity, and create measurable environmental impact through the media and advertising ecosystem.
It claims that if just 0.1% of the UK’s annual media spend followed this model, over £200m could be raised for UK nature recovery by 2030 – enough to fund the restoration of an area the size of Greater Birmingham.
Adam Boita, chief marketing officer at Ecologi, said: “We often hear of bringing nature into the boardroom, so we thought we’d flip that narrative and hold a board meeting with our co-founders and partners in nature to connect people to the very thing their business relies on.”
Hosted in collaboration with The National Forest Company, the meeting aimed to shape how the model could scale across the industry and combined this discussion with hands-on activities, such as habitat restoration and bluebell and yellow rattle plug planting.
So far, the initiative has unlocked £250,000 for UK nature recovery and is on track to reach £1m by the end of 2026.
Tim Pritchard, head of content and responsible media at MG OMD, said: “In one year, the partner network has grown from five to nearly 20. But what’s most important is that every partner has embraced it as an opportunity to collaborate more closely and be part of something that extends beyond individual campaigns.
“We now have a blueprint. If more of us choose to adopt that mindset, the cumulative impact could be extraordinary.”
To date, the initiative has supported 10 verified UK restoration projects, funded 19,969+ trees, restored 13,952 m² of habitat, avoided 2,869 tonnes CO₂e, and removed 132.8 tonnes CO₂.
Projects span peatland restoration to enhance carbon storage and flood resilience, native woodland creation to help rebuild fragmented habitats, and wildflower meadow restoration to support endangered pollinators and bird species.
It is also aligned with the Government’s 30×30 initiative, aiming to protect 30% of land and sea for nature by 2030.
