Orchards’ value to their local community is far higher than the profits from their fruit. Windfall – putting a value on the social and environmental importance of orchards demonstrates that the environmental, social and economic issues around orchards are at least twice as valuable to stakeholders as the traditional bottom line.

Based on research conducted by Dave Marshall, an Associate of the Bulmer Foundation, working with Herefordshire’s Orchard Topic Group, the study puts a financial value on benefits such as biodiversity, beauty, contribution to tourism and economic factors.

It reveals that marginal and even loss-making orchards can be of great importance to their communities and the wider environment.

The study consulted local residents to set a value for six orchards in Herefordshire, looking at nine social, environmental and economic factors.

Dr James Taplin, author of the report and a Senior Sustainability Advisor at Forum for the Future said: “We found that the local stakeholder groups we worked with placed huge importance upon their local orchards, even where they had no general public access, and that their role in defining local identity and the ‘feel’ of the landscape were common themes.”

Britain has lost the majority of its orchards because of the demand for new housing and land for grazing, growing cereals and soft fruits. According to Ordnance Survey data, 64 per cent have disappeared from the UK since 1950, with losses in some parts of the country exceeding 90 per cent.

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