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Latest #itsgreatoutthere grants will deliver thousands of days of outdoor activities

Grass roots projects around Europe are set to deliver thousands of days of outdoor activities after securing support from the It’s Great Out There Coalition. In the latest round of #itsgreatoutthere grants, seven non-profit initiatives will receive between €1,000 and €5,000, which will help them to deliver almost 2,000 ‘Outdoor Activity Days’ (OAD) in a natural environment, bringing together physical activity, inclusion and nature conservation. Thanks to the grants, projects in France, Finland and the UK will now be able to give many young people new experiences in the outdoors, safely and responsibly.
Launched in 2017 by the It’s Great Out There Coalition, the #itsgreatoutthere grants programme helps community based projects, which take new participants into the outdoors, with a particular focus on younger and more diverse audiences. Any non-profit organisation can apply for an #itsgreatoutthere grant and since they were introduced, they have supported XX projects, giving new experiences to thousands of people around Europe.
The It’s Great Out There Coalition focuses its work on delivering Outdoor Activity Days (OAD), each of which is an active day in nature, in line with minimum criteria and aligned to the latest World Health Organization guidelines that recommend at least 150 minutes of physical activity every week. Thanks to the introduction of OAD, the coalition can demonstrate the impact of every donation that supports its work to get Europe more active in the outdoors. During each round of #itsgreatoutoutthere grants, applications are assessed against key criteria and for the first time this year, coalition members were able to vote for their favoured projects.

Following the application process and voting, the seven projects that have been awarded #itsgreatoutthere grants are (see the following article for more information):

  • Outdoor Days for Women Beginners (Taivasalla Outdoor Club, Finland)
  • True Nature Project (AKA – Health Wealth & Oneness CIC, United Kingdom), in partnership with Equip Outdoors
  • Outdoors to Share (Outdoor People, United Kingdom)
  • Girls Count! Adventures (BLAST Fest Ltd, United Kingdom)
  • Minds Matter (Young Gloucestershire, United Kingdom)
  • Family in the Mountains (En Passant Par La Montagne, France), in partnership with Mammut
  • IGOT Outdoor with Ternua By CREPS (CREPS Auvergne Rhône Alpes Vallon Pont d’Arc Lyon Voiron, France), in partnership with Ternua.

Margo de Lange, policy officer at the It’s Great Out There Coalition, comments: “Once again, we have been able to provide assistance to a diverse set of deserving grass roots projects around Europe with the latest #itsgreatoutthere grants. We received some very strong applications, so it was really helpful to have the input of It’s Great Out There Coalition members when we assessed all of them.

“Thanks to our focus on Outdoor Activity Days, we will be able to monitor, assess and report on the impact of every investment that we make to get Europe more active in nature. All of this is possible thanks to the hugely valued ongoing support of our members, some of whom have gone even further by providing additional support to the non-profit organisations which will be delivering the projects.

“This model is very effective. First, we are actively helping people get active outdoors and second, we are gathering the clear evidence of the positive impacts of doing that, which we can use to lobby policy makers about why they should be supporting our work in a sustained and significant way.”

For more information about the #itsgreatoutthere grants programme, visit www.itsgreatoutthere.com/grants.