Broadland: Sustainability Fund back for its second year

Broadland District Council's recycling and waste partner, Veolia, has launched this year's Sustainability Fund, in partnership with The Council to help support people across Broadland to transform their local environments and communities.

2022 was an incredibly successful year for The Sustainability Fund, supporting 11 grassroots projects with over £9,800 in funding and they're once again looking to back projects that make a positive, sustainable difference to the local area and to deliver long-term social and environmental benefits.

With funding as well as in-kind resources and volunteers available, Veolia and Broadland District Council aim to empower people to take positive action in their local area and deliver ecological transformation.  

Applications opened 21 April, just in time to celebrate World Earth Day 2023. On this day, every year, global residents are encouraged to act, innovate and implement.

If you’re unsure whether your project fits the criteria, here are some examples of previous projects that were successful in previous years:

• Scrapbox is a charity in Reepham which reclaims waste materials from local businesses, commerce and individuals which would otherwise end up in landfill. These are re-purposed as resources for art and crafting activities within the local community. Thanks to the funding, they have made their warehouse more energy efficient and replaced old signage.
• The Papillon project is an educational charity that promotes sustainable living and environmental awareness for young people, through secondary schools and sixth-form colleges in Norfolk. In 2023 they will be teaching students how to grow their own food and with the support of the Sustainability Fund they have sourced new gardening tools to get digging!
• Brundall Community River Watch, led by the Brundall Men’s Shed in Broadland, will see that the River Yare is kept clean through regular litter picks to save the river from pollution and contribute to their local community. The funding has been used to purchase new tools for the Men’s shed and litter picking equipment.

Veolia’s Sustainability Fund is open to not-for-profit organisations, community groups or individuals in areas where the company partners with the local authority to deliver waste and cleansing services for the community.

Applications can be made on Veolia’s website or on Spacehive, Veolia’s crowdfunding partner until Friday 29 September.

All applications will be considered, but projects should aim to fulfil at least one of the following criteria; enhancing biodiversity, promoting sustainable behaviours (reduce, reuse and/or recycle), protecting or preserving resources and the environment and using recycled, reused or reclaimed materials.

Duncan McBurney, Contract Manager at Veolia said:

"Launching the Sustainability Fund in Broadland was one of our greatest successes of 2022 and we’re so thrilled to offer this funding opportunity to the residents of the District again. As we work towards ecological transformation in collaboration with our communities, we can’t wait to see the inspiring and innovative ideas they come up with in 2023.”

Petula Chenery, Manager of Scrapbox said:

"We were absolutely thrilled to have been awarded £750 through Veolia’s Sustainability Fund in 2022. As a re-use Charity, we are passionate to protect our environment for future generations and we aspire to run our Charity in as eco-friendly a manner as possible. We’ll be using part of the grant to replace all the old fluorescent lights in both our shop and our warehouse with new, LED strip lights, which will not only save us money on our energy bills, but will mean that the quality of light for our customers and staff in the work environment will be so much better too! Thank you again, Veolia; this award means a great deal to us and will make a big difference to our operation and how we can continue to provide reclaimed art and crafting materials saved from landfill here in Norfolk."