The Landworkers’ Alliance is a union of farmers, growers, foresters and land-based workers.
cy Cymraeg
cy Cymraeg

Feedback for us

If you have any comments, critiques, considerations, compliments, complaints, about anything the Landworkers Alliance is or isn’t up to, do let us know your thought. We love feedback, it keeps a system healthy. Please fill in this quick form.

Membership / Supporter / Donation Queries

Please contact Lauren.Simpson@staging.landworkersalliance.org.uk

Requests for work, volunteering or internships

We are currently not recruiting for any roles but please read our newsletters for any announcements. We currently do not offer any volunteer or internship placements directly with the LWA, but keep an eye out in the newsletter or on the forum for any members looking for volunteers or workers.

Academic/Research Enquiries

Please look at the Agroecology Research Collaboration to see if it fits your area of research/work.

Membership Support / Advice

Currently the LWA does not have capacity or resources to help individual members or potential members on their specific projects, farms or programmes. We get a lot of requests for individual support and would love to have the time to respond to each request in full. We are fundraising for a new role for somebody to focus on membership support and services as we have identified it is a gap in our offering so please watch this space. Having said that, if your query is critical and urgent please email info@staging.landworkersalliance.org.uk including the word URGENT in the subject header and it will get picked up and we can try our best to help.

Contacting Individual Staff

Please take the time to explore our staff page here to see who the most relevant contact for your enquiry is.

Our addresses format is firstname.lastname@staging.landworkersalliance.org.uk

Please bear in mind we all work part time and have limited capacity to respond to enquiries outside our core areas of work.

You can also find information under the About Us header about branch and regional organising, and identity groups within the LWA membership.

Press/Media Enquiries:

For any queries relating to press please email press@staging.landworkersalliance.org.uk

Merchandise/calendar Enquiries

For any enquiries to do with shop sales including the calendar please email merchandise@staging.landworkersalliance.org.uk

To Include an Item in Our Newsletter:

You can fill in this quick form to submit it to be included in the next bulletin/newsletter. The deadline to submit is the end of Friday each week for the following week’s member bulletin. With the same form you can also submit to the monthly non-member newsletter which goes out in the first week of the month.

All Other Enquiries:

For any other enquiries that are URGENT please email info@staging.landworkersalliance.org.uk with the word ‘urgent’ in the subject header and we will do our best to help.

SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER

Follow Us

Farmstart Network

 

FARMSTART NETWORK

To help overcome some of the obstacles facing new entrants to farming, the Landworkers’ Alliance is working with member organisations running ‘farm-start’ and ‘farm-incubation’ projects around the UK to develop a network of best practice and encourage the development of new opportunities.
If you would like to chat with us about this work, get in touch with hatty.richards@staging.landworkersalliance.org.uk
What is a Farmstart?
Farmstarts are an important entry route into farming, and fill a gap in opportunities for new entrants. They provide an opportunity for people to test their farming and growing ideas in a protected environment, whilst building the knowledge, skills, confidence and experience to progress to their own farm or market garden. How a Farmstart operates and the level of support available to new entrants can vary greatly, however all farmstarts provide:
– access to land and equipment
– routes to market
– business support, training or mentoring
Through this provision of support, farmstarts take much of the financial risk and stress away from new entrants in the crucial early phases, allowing them to focus on working out what kind of business suits them best.
For most people, taking on a farmstart opportunity will follow on from some form of training and on-farm work experience, and will give them time in which to test their ideas before making further steps to start their own business on long-term foundations.
To read more about what constitutes a farmstart and why they are so important read our guide.
What is the Farmstart Network?
The farmstart network is a cluster of organisations that share experiences and support one another in the spirit of mutual aid and solidarity.
We host ‘introduction to farmstart’ and ‘how to start a farmstart’ workshops for organisations who are interested in starting farmstarts.
We arrange site visits and network get-togethers
We share knowledge and resources
Currently running Farmstarts and Incubator Farms:
– Kindling Trust in Manchester – see case study
– Tamar Grow Local in the Tamar Valley – see case study
– OrganicLea in London – see case study
– Mach Maethlon in Machynlleth
– LESS in Lancaster
How do organisations become part of the network? 
To be a network member you must be an organisation in the process of developing or already running a project which includes  the 3 core features of a farmstart (see top of page). If this sounds like you, please fill out this form and we will be in touch with you. 
If you are interested in collaborating with the network or supporting it’s work, we’d love to hear from you, get in touch with hatty.richards@staging.landworkersalliance.org.uk
If you are a budding grower or farmer looking for opportunities to work on a farmstart, please check individual network members’ websites for details.  LWA work to support new entrants into farming in a number of ways, have a look at our New Entrants page for more details and useful resources.
Resources:
To support the development of more farm start sites we have produced a guide, which includes a set of case studies to provide some best practice guidelines, based on the experiences of established organisations.

Please subscribe to our e-newsletter.

This information will never be shared with a third party