We worked together to…

Take Climate Action

Our Nourish Kirriemuir Project aimed to…

0 Tonnes
Grow two tonnes of local food.
0 Tonnes
Save six tonnes of food from waste.
0 People
Engage 500 people in the climate emergency.

In March 2020, we were awarded funding from the Scottish Government’s Climate Challenge Fund (CCF) to the sum of £162,644.

The Climate Challenge Fund was a previous Scottish Government grant programme. CCF provided funding and support to help community-led organisations in Scotland tackle climate change through projects that reduced local carbon emissions. Over 1,150 projects across all 32 local authorities were awarded CCF grants for activities involving energy efficiency, sustainable travel, local food and resource efficiency. Total CCF funding over its lifetime exceeded £115 million.

The funding was put towards a 2-year project called Nourish Kirriemuir, which had three main aims:

    • Grow 2 tonnes of local food.
    • Cut food waste and other waste by 6 tonnes.
    • Support 500 people to increase their awareness and understanding of climate change.

The project was developed following a number of conversations with our town’s schools, community groups and members of the public, as well as Angus Council. We wanted to address climate change in ways that the people of Kirriemuir wanted; reducing waste and growing food were top of the list.

Climate Challenge Fund

Read our final report here.

Our Achievements

We helped volunteers from the community to grow 1.14 tonnes of local food.

  • We established and began growing food at 3 gardens, set up in our 3 Kirriemuir schools.
  • We provided support to 225 households across Kirriemuir and the Glens to grow their own food in their back gardens, providing many with raised bed food growing kits.
  • We launched our Get Set Grow Challenge, (previously the Angus Growing Award). This course supported anyone in the local area to grow their own veg and learn permaculture techniques.
  • We supported Kirriemuir Food Hub in the development of their ‘Hub Garden’, providing fresh, locally grown produce to those most in need.

We helped reduce carbon emissions by over 90 tCO2e, by supporting Kirriemuir Food hub in cutting food waste by over 24.5 tonnes.

  • We partnered up with Kirriemuir Food Hub to establish a community fridge, where any member of the public can help to use up surplus food otherwise destined for the bin! We redirected over 24 tonnes of surplus food from waste. This is equates to a carbon saving of more than 80 tco2e.
  • Our Suss Your Food challenge was developed and launched; a habit forming framework which helped households to reduce their food waste and make more sustainable food choices.
  • We established a Sustainable Fashion group and held various events about the damaging effects of Fast Fashion.

We supported over 500 people in our community to increase their awareness and understanding of climate change and enable them to make informed choices on how to move to a low-carbon lifestyle.

  • More than 500 people engaged with us at various events and activities around waste, growing, and climate change.
  • Due to Covid-19, many of our events and activities took place online. Despite this, we managed to hold over 80 different events including movie nights, climate cafes, art workshops, cook-alongs, seasonal food days, speaker events and more!
  • We ran a reusable period products campaign in partnership with Free Period Angus, which provided more than 130 people in Kirriemuir and the Glens with reusable products.
  • We held an online seed gathering event, which attracted over 100 people from across the world. Topics included establishing wildflower meadows, plastic free gardening, all things potato, refugee gardens and seed saving.
Painting at Southmuir