Mighty oaks from little acorns grow: the underestimated potential of community gardening as a force for building stronger communities.

At a time of increasing social fragmentation — where just 5% of Britons say they feel very connected to their local community — our research highlights the way green spaces elevate connection; with those who spend four hours or more a week in public green space being almost twice as likely to feel connected to their community (65%), as those who spend none (34%).

Yet, access to these spaces remains deeply unequal. Our new analysis of the ‘green space gap’ finds that neighbourhoods with the greatest provision of publicly accessible green space have more than 20,000 times as much per person as those with the least – where the average is just 0.05m2, less than an A4 sheet of paper. People of colour and those on lower incomes are disproportionately represented in areas with the least green space.

In this report, produced with Friends of the Earth, we show how community greening can:

Strengthen community connection: creating spaces for people to meet, work together and build relationships with neighbours they might otherwise not meet.

Build pride, ownership and agency: giving people a meaningful role in improving and caring for the places they call home.

Improve health and wellbeing: helping more people spend time in good-quality nature and experience the physical and psychological benefits it brings.

Bridge divides: bringing people of different backgrounds and political perspectives together around a shared activity.

Broaden environmental engagement: starting with the local issues people already care about.

Build climate and environmental resilience: supporting biodiversity and creating greener neighbourhoods, better equipped for a changing climate.

And there is an appetite to act. While just 3% of Britons say they would attend a climate protest, almost half (49%) would be interested in taking part in a local project to improve green spaces.

Community greening offers a practical way to transform neglected spaces into places of pride, connection and collective agency.

Closing the green space gap requires investment – in good-quality public green space alongside the rights, resources and long-term support communities need to shape and care for their local area. With that support, community greening can create a virtuous cycle of green places, stronger communities and greater environmental agency.