The Unsuitablog

Something like 10 years ago I joined an organisation which I thought would be able to make a real difference; the Woodland Trust had been, and certainly for a considerable time after I joined, have been true stalwarts in the essential job of protecting, managing and replanting the native woodland of the UK. Their work on climate related phenology has been second to none; they have been responsible for bringing doomed woodlands back from the brink of destruction, and have re-established woodlands where once they had been. They have involved thousands of children in educational and practical work…the list goes on.

Then, a couple of years ago, they started ramping up the process of attracting corporate sponsors. It’s not as though money was particularly tight – between 2001 and 2006 their total income steadily rose from just under £16 million to nearly £22 million, with no sign of any financial worries; but for whatever reason, perhaps because certain trustees deemed it “the right thing to do”, they started attempting to attract corporate funding in earnest.

Back in 2001, company donations accounted for a mere £96,000, and that went down in 2002. In 2004 it was still only £140,000. After that they stopped publishing the company donations total in their accounts, but as of 2008, the combined total of company donations and the larger landfill tax and charitable trusts was £2.3 million. Of this, company donations probably still only accounted for less than a quarter of this out of a total income of nearly £30 million. Legacies and member donations, on the other hand, accounted for well over 40% of their income, compared to the probable 2% that was given in company sponsorship.

So why then, does the Woodland Trust make such relationships? Could it have anything to do with the fact that one of their trustees is the former Chief Executive of the biofuel company D1? Possibly, though maybe that trustee appointment is more to do with the general direction the Woodland Trust was already taking. Corporate sponsorship seems to be an addiction in the cut-and-thrust world of charitable fundraising, and like WWF, it doesn’t take long before your image is thoroughly tarred. At the time of writing, the Woodland Trust has corporate partnerships with companies as grossly inappropriate as BP, Ikea, Sainsburys, Ronseal (Thompson), Tesco and Hilton Hotels : all companies that have a hugely negative impact on the natural environment. You can read the full list of donors in their annual reviews, but to save you the time, here are some other choice cuts from their 2008 review:

ALD Automotive
BMW
British Land
Calor
Georgia Pacific
Honda UK

Oh, and Disney. This is no casual partnership, though: it warrants an entire page of their Autumn 2009 magazine — the one I just got through the post — plus a major news release earlier in the year. It will come as no surprise that Disney has featured on The Unsuitablog before; here’s a taster of the article:

There were all sorts of alternative images I could have put at the top of this article: sweatshop workers sewing together Disney branded clothes or assembling Disney branded toys and other consumer goods; container ships full of Disney goods, crossing the oceans with wares destined for every nation touched by the rank hand of industrialisation; airports full of people waiting for their departure to one of the Disney resorts dotted around the world, or aircraft in the air pumping out greenhouse gases directly created by the desire to travel to a Disney resort; landfill sites full of Disney goods, slowly leaching their toxins into the ground; queues of gas-guzzling traffic and hyper parking lots outside shopping malls replete with Disney Stores full of toxic, climate changing, sweatshop produced consumer items; children goggle-eyed before the latest saccharine-sweet, consumer-friendly, merchandise-linked version of the world brought to you by your friendly corporation; fast food stores full of obese families drawn towards the counters by the offer of Disney toys with every Happy Meal; a globe full of brainwashed humans, on their knees, praying in the direction of a Magic Castle, that sits at the centre of a vast concrete, brick, chrome and plastic complex that used to be a swath of pristine, wildlife-rich Everglade.

Not the sort of company that really sits comfortably with the idea of protecting ancient woodlands, educating children about the importance of a healthy ecosystem and warning about the dangers of climate change. Yet in the magazine article we see the following:

“Disney Store is the first big company to help turn our dream of making a vast new forest close to where people live into a reality,” says Sue Holden, the Trust’s chief executive. “By working closely with them [Disney], we aim to inspire thousands of children to look after the environment, as well as creating a fantastic woodland that will excite generations to come.”

Hundreds of children from schools within a 15-mile radius of Heartwood Forest have already attended curriculum linked woodland discovery days during which they looked at flowers indicative of ancient woodland, drew pictures and wrote poems…also popular was a brief appearance by Mickey Mouse as part of the Disney launch.

Disney have a long and tarnished record of making partnerships with organisations to gain influence over the education and other activities of children, and they have plenty of their own irons in the fire: they already owned Hyperion Books for Children, ClubPenguin and an “education” company called Disney Educational Products among many others, and only last year did they buy RaisingKids.co.uk, an online parenting forum!

In the case of the Woodland Trust, how much do you reckon it cost Disney for all this exposure to young minds?

Nothing. All the money for the £100,000 donation came from selling something to their customers they otherwise would not have bought.

As for me: well, I’m resigning from the Woodland Trust. I’ve had enough of this hypocrisy.