230609PerfCtteePaper3NatureFestival

For Dis­cus­sion

Title: Cairngorms Nature Fest­iv­al Pre­pared by: Sarah Hen­shall, Head of Conservation

Pur­pose This paper presents an over­view of the Cairngorms Nature Fest­iv­al (CNF), a sum­mary of activ­ity for the event in 2023 and an assess­ment of per­form­ance against stra­tegic aims and objectives.

Recom­mend­a­tions The per­form­ance com­mit­tee is asked to review deliv­ery updates and con­sider a) pro­gress against deliv­ery of the pro­ject object­ives; b) sum­mary of the 2023 event; and c) any stra­tegic­ally sig­ni­fic­ant impacts on delivery

Stra­tegic background

1. Cairngorms Nature Fest­iv­al (CNF) is one of the most high-pro­file events in the Nation­al Park for rais­ing aware­ness and under­stand­ing of, and build­ing pub­lic sup­port for, object­ives in the Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan and in par­tic­u­lar the col­lect­ive work towards Nature object­ives regard­ing land man­age­ment, deer and moor­land man­age­ment, and eco­sys­tem restoration.

2. The Fest­iv­al also plays a key, sup­port­ing role in the deliv­ery of object­ives across the suite of activ­ity in the NPPP, not­ably: B9: Men­tal and phys­ic­al health; B10: A Park for All; B11: Volun­teer­ing and out­door learn­ing; and C10: Cul­tur­al heritage

3. The CNF sup­ports the Her­it­age Hori­zons: Cairngorms 2030 pro­gramme in rais­ing aware­ness and under­stand­ing of the nature and cli­mate emer­gen­cies; inspir­ing people to take for­wards pro-envir­on­ment­al beha­viours; cre­at­ing a great­er con­nec­tion to land­scapes and fos­ter­ing a sense of place; and shap­ing the way we engage with res­id­ents and visitors.

4. CNF is the key deliv­ery mech­an­ism for meet­ing one of the Cairngorms Nature Action Plan’s three aims: ​‘Enga­ging, inspir­ing and encour­aging loc­al com­munit­ies and

com­munit­ies of interest to value and care for nature, be proud of the con­ser­va­tion work in the Cairngorms and want to do some­thing to pro­tect and enhance their nat­ur­al heritage’.

1. The fest­iv­al forms the back­bone of the asso­ci­ated pri­or­ity areas of work to recog­nise & cel­eb­rate good con­ser­va­tion work; increase engage­ment and provide oppor­tun­it­ies to get involved; and get more people act­ively and respons­ibly enjoy­ing nature.

Per­form­ance Dashboard

Per­form­ance Meas­ure: deliv­ery of pro­ject object­ives	Rat­ing	Com­ment­ary
To raise the pro­file of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park as an excep­tion­al place for wildlife	Green	New Cairngorms Nature Fest­iv­al web­site developed for 2023. Increased digit­al activ­ity and great­er aware­ness on social media chan­nels, loc­al Face­book com­munity groups, a tar­geted ad cam­paign and digit­al advert­ise­ment with extern­al news sites. Social media reach as of 19 May 308,631, with 4,325 link clicks through to web­site. Nation­al media cov­er­age through radio and print, evid­ence of nation­al reach also through social media.
To show­case and cel­eb­rate the work of land man­agers and the Cairngorms Nature partnership	Amber	60 part­ners were involved in run­ning events: 16 con­ser­va­tion organ­isa­tions; 7 estates; 10 ranger ser­vices; 13 com­munity groups; 21 busi­nesses and indi­vidu­als More work to be done with stake­hold­ers to devel­op and involve more event pro­viders in future. As exper­i­ence and capa­city builds in exper­i­enced event pro­viders, CNPA will be able to under-rep­res­en­ted groups more.
To increase engage­ment with nature amongst tar­get audi­ences and enthuse tar­get audi­ences about the unique nature of the Cairngorms	Green	Feed­back an eval­u­ation from 2023 will provide inform­a­tion on audi­ence pro­file. Art com­pet­i­tion engaged with 15 schools and com­munit­ies across the Park. 29 fam­il­ies atten­ded the art finale event

Per­form­ance Meas­ure: deliv­ery of pro­ject object­ives	Rat­ing	Com­ment­ary
To act as a mech­an­ism towards mov­ing people along the engage­ment pathway	Green	tak­ing part in nature activ­it­ies with rangers, CNF has encom­passed Green Health Week. Large num­bers of loc­al par­ti­cipants com­bin­ing health with show­cas­ing nature. Event par­ti­cip­a­tion includes the oppor­tun­ity to ​‘opt-in to hear more about the events and nature activ­it­ies in the Nation­al Park.’ In 2022 this res­ul­ted in 186 sign-ups for e‑newsletters. Fig­ures for 2023 will be avail­able in due course. The social media plan ensured fol­low up oppor­tun­it­ies were iden­ti­fied in advance, par­tic­u­larly around volun­teer­ing oppor­tun­it­ies, and pro­moted as part of that path­way to cap­it­al­ise on event success.
Bring­ing people togeth­er to build a sense of com­munity around Cairngorms Nature	Amber	Over 60 part­ners con­trib­uted time and resources to deliv­er events. Events provide oppor­tun­it­ies for people to meet and enjoy nature togeth­er in their com­munit­ies i.e from one event in Aviemore there is now a Grant­own moth group. More work needed to identi­fy oppor­tun­it­ies for com­munit­ies and ongo­ing volun­teer­ing to sup­port deliv­ery of Cairngorms Nature work.
Sup­port loc­al busi­nesses, artists, cre­at­ives, organ­isa­tions and communities	Amber	Social media engage­ment provided a for­um for dia­logue and con­ver­sa­tions about nature high­light­ing pri­or­ity spe­cies and ongo­ing work and oppor­tun­it­ies. Cairngorms Busi­ness Part­ner­ship is involved in CNF plan­ning and deliv­ery. The pro­gramme included inclus­ive week­end events to encour­age overnight stays.

Per­form­ance Meas­ure: deliv­ery of pro­ject object­ives	Rat­ing	Com­ment­ary
Increas­ing access­ib­il­ity to the Nation­al Park and the bene­fits of being in nature	Green	The Fest­iv­al sup­por­ted loc­al busi­ness through pro­mo­tion of their paid fest­iv­al events, using loc­al sup­pli­ers for deliv­ery of CNP events. Poten­tial for bet­ter col­lab­or­a­tion in the future eg in part­ner­ing busi­nesses with char­it­ies and com­munity groups for spon­sor­ships and ongo­ing rela­tion­ships. Events tailored for people with dis­ab­il­it­ies and isolated/​hard to reach groups — i.e hand­bik­ing, access­ible canoe­ing, off-road wheel­chair taster and refugee health walk. Over 50% of the events are low cost or free of charge which is key to inclu­sion in the Park. Cur­rently only a small num­ber of land man­age­ment focused events and access­ible events, more of these types of events could be developed if staff resource was increased. New web­site serves as an inform­a­tion hub where events can be eas­ily searched using a range of cri­ter­ia includ­ing: wheel­chair access, toi­lets, fam­ily friendly and free events. On each event page, pub­lic trans­port and full access­ib­il­ity inform­a­tion is dis­played, includ­ing any hid­den costs such as park­ing fees.

Stra­tegic risk management

1. The latest review of the Stra­tegic Risk Register was con­sidered by the Audit and Risk Com­mit­tee in Decem­ber 2022. Stra­tegic risks of rel­ev­ance to con­sid­er­a­tion of per­form­ance of the pro­grammes of work con­sidered by this paper are:

a) A9.3 Staff­ing: addi­tion­al extern­ally fun­ded pro­jects strains staff work­load capa­city with increased risks of stress and reduced mor­ale. • Staff resource required to sup­port the Fest­iv­al has increased and put strain on indi­vidu­al CNPA staff mem­bers and teams dur­ing peak plan­ning and deliv­ery peri­ods. This includes across depart­ments in CNPA, par­tic­u­larly com­mu­nic­a­tions teams and ranger ser­vices. There is a risk that the demands on CNPA time and resource exceed those cur­rently avail­able. This risk is under man­age­ment by the Oper­a­tion­al Man­age­ment Team as part of staff work plans and reviews of resource pri­or­it­ies and alloc­a­tions. The cur­rent budget is suf­fi­cient to run the Festival.

b) A 28 Staff­ing: deliv­ery of key out­comes is impacted by staff turnover, par­tic­u­larly in pro­ject teams. • Organ­isa­tion and deliv­ery of the Fest­iv­al is sig­ni­fic­antly impacted by con­tinu­ity, or lack of, in the staff team. Rela­tion­ships with event pro­viders and ​‘les­sons learnt’ from suc­cess­ive years is crit­ic­al to suc­cess. The post is cur­rently a 3 yr fixed term con­tract, due to end in Novem­ber 2024. Fixed term con­tracts are under peri­od­ic review by Seni­or Man­age­ment Team to man­age this risk.

c) A26 Repu­ta­tion­al: key com­mu­nic­a­tions activ­it­ies, mes­saging and (in some cases) brand aware­ness rais­ing can be depend­ent on part­ner col­lab­or­a­tion rather than under dir­ect con­trol, with poten­tial for inef­fect­ive or dis­join­ted com­mu­nic­a­tion out­comes. • There is an expect­a­tion on CNPA to provide suf­fi­cient sup­port to event pro­viders. A short­fall in meet­ing this expect­a­tion could res­ult in poorly planned and delivered events and loss of con­fid­ence in part­ners to invest their time and resources to devel­op, pro­mote and deliv­er Fest­iv­al events to a high stand­ard. • The Fest­iv­al has built strong rela­tion­ships with over 60 part­ners and stake­hold­ers deliv­er­ing events over a dec­ade. There is an expect­a­tion that it will do so in the future.

d) A14.1 Repu­ta­tion­al: One-off, high pro­file incid­ents and / or voci­fer­ous social media cor­res­pond­ents have an undue influ­ence on the Authority’s pos­it­ive repu­ta­tion. • Fest­iv­al events are delivered by part­ner organ­isa­tions, with CNPA provid­ing primar­ily a co-ordin­at­ing and pro­mo­tion­al role. How­ever, by asso­ci­ation and pro­file, the Park Authority’s repu­ta­tion is closely asso­ci­ated with the qual­ity of events. Equally, Fest­iv­al events are branded and there­fore asso­ci­ated with com­mu­nic­a­tion of the brand val­ues. There is a risk that neg­at­ive PR or poor qual­ity reflect on the Nation­al Park and Park Authority.

2023 Fest­iv­al summary

Num­ber of events	Event theme
• 82 dis­tinct events	• 7 volun­teer­ing events
• 158 activ­it­ies (instances of the events)	• 55 events provid­ing a unique nature experience
• 60 part­ners — 16 con­ser­va­tion organ­isa­tions; 7 estates; 10 ranger ser­vices; 13 com­munity groups; 21 busi­nesses and individuals	• 57 out­door activities
	• 35 guided walks
	• 10 events focus­ing on music, arts and culture
	• 25 events enabling train­ing and skills development

Event audi­ence	Event type
• 50 fam­ily friendly events	• 43 free events (52%)
• 32 adult-only events	• 12 drop-in events
• 31 events with wheel­chair access	• 60 book­able events – with a total capa­city of 1700
	• 23 events that do not require book­ing many of which had unlim­ited capacity

Art com­pet­i­tion

1. 15 schools involved in art com­pet­i­tion with 29 final­ists over 110 attendees at Grand Prize­giv­ing Cere­mony at Mar Lodge Ballroom

Volun­teer­ing events

1. Caper­cail­lie Hab­it­at event at Bal­mor­al, Con­ser­va­tion Volun­teer­ing at Mar Lodge, Tree Nurs­ery at Cairngorms Con­nect, Pro­tect­ing Pine­woods with FLS Glenmore
2. NES­BREC Wild­life Record­ing, OATS Path Maintenance
3. But­ter­fly Con­ser­va­tion — Kentish Glory Egg Hunt
4. Twelve volun­teer Rangers sup­por­ted 7 events across the Nature Festival

Fest­iv­al highlights

1. The ​‘Kentish Glory Moth Trap and Egg Hunt’ event in Aviemore — organ­ised by But­ter­fly Con­ser­va­tion — was atten­ded by over 20 people, from experts to com­plete begin­ners. The event has inspired par­ti­cipants to cre­ate the Grant­own Moth Group. The group matches up enthu­si­asts with those new to nature, break­ing down bar­ri­ers and cre­at­ing a wel­com­ing com­munity for learn­ing, bio­lo­gic­al record­ing, and the enjoy­ment of nature.

2. The Cairngorms Nature Fest­iv­al Art Com­pet­i­tion reached over 1000 pupils in 15 primary schools across the Park. Over 110 people atten­ded the Grand Prize­giv­ing Cere­mony in the Ball­room at Mar Lodge Estate. The win­ners of each cat­egory received the Grand Prize of a trip for their entire class to the High­land Wild­life Park.

3. Cairngorms Nature Fest­iv­al worked in part­ner­ship with Nature 4 Health to organ­ise a hike up Meall ​‘a Bhua­chaille and lunch at Ryvoan Bothy for 31 refugees. Pete Short, one of the CNPA Rangers who sup­por­ted the walk, described the day as ​“one of the most reward­ing days as a Ranger I have had”.

Fest­iv­al attendees

1. Via Event­bright book­able events we can col­lect inform­a­tion that allows us to estab­lish attendee demo­graph­ics and feed­back on mar­ket­ing, trans­port, ease of access etc. Many event pro­viders man­age their own book­ings, and for feed­back on these events we will com­mu­nic­ate with them dir­ectly. Feed­back is also being col­lec­ted from event pro­viders and attendees via online surveys.

2. From the feed­back so far 33% of attendees were res­id­ent in CNP, 35% day trip­pers from with 50 miles, the remainder are from fur­ther afield includ­ing one fam­ily from out­side the UK. 50% of respond­ents trav­elled to the Nation­al Park spe­cific­ally for the CNF.

Web­site and social media cov­er­age and reach

Web­site Ana­lyt­ics	2022	2023
Total pageviews	37,939	50,834
Avg Time on Page	1m 20s	2m 35s

Page Title	Page views
Home page	11,606
Events page	11,464
Map	1,542
Con­cert, Ceilidh & Cock­tails Event	910
Our Part­ners	565

1. Through paid social media advert­ise­ment on the Nation­al Park and Nature chan­nels: Reach of 308,631 — 4,325 link clicks through to Cairngorms Nature Fest­iv­al web­site A more in-depth ana­lys­is of our social media engage­ment will be under­taken over the com­ing weeks.

Fest­iv­al feedback

1. Some quotes from our par­ti­cipants sur­vey which is ongoing:

a) ​“Upland path res­tor­a­tion with OATS. I enjoyed try­ing some­thing totally new for me. It was a way to appre­ci­ate these parks in a new way, to work with the people that keep our paths in good shape and our nature pro­tec­ted for all beings to enjoy.”

b) ​“The Wild­ing pro­ject [was my favour­ite event] because the guided tour taught me, in my 50s, so much more about nature when I felt I already knew so much!”

c) ​“The begin­ners’ bird iden­ti­fic­a­tion walk at Blair Atholl [was my favour­ite event]. It has opened a whole new world when out for a walk.”

d) ​“Deer man­age­ment on the Bal­mor­al estate. An excel­lent, well run course with extens­ive data and oth­er inform­a­tion about man­age­ment of the estate and the CNP. Con­grat­u­la­tions to the organ­isers and many thanks for your efforts.”

e) ​“Strath­spey Story­walks: Self-Guided Fair­ies and Fables Tour. We loved the fact that we could access this at any­time and made for an inter­est­ing and enjoy­able afternoon.”

f) ​“Staulk­ers … liked hear­ing about how the Scot­tish gov’t is work­ing with land own­ers to man­age the deer.”

Fin­ance and staffing

1. Budget for 2023 was £45,000 this included £11,200 for web­site devel­op­ment. The budget for ²⁰²³⁄₂₄ is £35,000. This is con­sidered suf­fi­cient to sup­port com­mu­nic­a­tions and mar­ket­ing, event sup­port and ​‘flag­ship’ events run by CNPA.

2. The Cairngorms Nature Engage­ment Officer (1 FTE) is ded­ic­ated to work on the Fest­iv­al almost full time between Janu­ary and May. In the run up to and dur­ing the Fest­iv­al large amounts of TOIL and flexi are gen­er­ated. This year two interns were recruited to help with deliv­ery of the Fest­iv­al and man­age the resource and time demands on the Cairngorms Nature Engage­ment Officer. This proved highly suc­cess­ful. As part of the feed­back and review pro­cess, fur­ther invest­ig­a­tion will look to estab­lish how the resource demands can be spread out over the year, allow­ing fur­ther work on the user nature jour­ney and provid­ing more oppor­tun­it­ies for par­ti­cipants to con­tin­ue to engage and volun­teer and deliv­er­ing the stra­tegic aims out­lined above.

3. In the weeks pre­ced­ing and dur­ing the Fest­iv­al 3.5 FTE from the com­mu­nic­a­tions team were also deployed on it. There was also sig­ni­fic­ant resource con­tri­bu­tion from comms dur­ing the web­site devel­op­ment and brand­ing work.

Sarah Hen­shall 25 May 2023 sarahhenshall@​cairngorms.​co.​uk