The Welsh Government has been advised to create dog-free zones to help make the outdoors “anti-racist”.
Labour’s devolved administration has pledged to rid Wales of racism by 2030, and set out a plan to ensure “all areas” of public life were transformed.
According to a report submitted to the Welsh Government to steer “anti-racist” policy, dog-free zones should be created to make the outdoors more inclusive.
The report by the environmental group Climate Cymru BAME advises, as part of a suite of proposals, that authorities should create “dog-free areas in local green spaces”.
The reason for this is not elaborated on in the report, which will be used by the Welsh Government to “support policy teams” who are “developing and implementing” anti-racist plans for Wales.
The report was part of a call for evidence to assess “racism relating to climate change, environment, and rural affairs”, in order to steer how green spaces can be made to align with the Labour’s 2022 Anti-Racist Wales Action Plan.
On the basis of reports provided to date, the Welsh Government has concluded that ethnic minorities face “barriers” to the outdoors created by “exclusions and racism”.
Barriers to outdoor activities includes the perception that growing food in gardens or allotments is an activity “dominated by middle-aged white women”.
A report submitted to the Welsh Labour Government by the environmental group Green Soul recorded the complaint that food growing groups are run by “majority White/British/Welsh individuals” and “older white people”.
Climate Cymru BAME, along with groups polled to inform the anti-racist policy, suggested that ethnic minority residents could be directed to “community led” food growing groups to mitigate the issue.
One report to the Welsh Government complained that the environmental sector was not sufficiently inclusive, stating that environmentalism is “essentially a white middle class issue” and groups are filled with people from a “white middle-class background”.
A separate set of recommendations submitted by the North Wales Africa Society suggested that “dog-free areas” should be created, explaining that during its focus groups “one black African female stated that she feels unsafe with the presence of dogs”.
The report also noted that others kept “seeing dog fouling on the floor”.
Mess and the quality of urban green spaces was an issue consistently recorded in reports of ethnic minority experiences fed to the Welsh Government.
One respondent in a “community dialogue” focus group complained that “the green spaces are not respected in areas where there is a bigger population of ethnic minority people”.
Other issues raised included a lack of public transport access to non-urban green spaces, and the poor air quality in towns and cities.
Summarising findings and recommendations submitted by polled groups, a Welsh Government report published on Nov 6 also stated that “some participants expressed apprehension about visiting the countryside owing to their racial or religious identities”.
It added that there were “concerns of the lack of understanding and relationships by the wider white population particularly in rural areas, from personal experiences”.
Ultimately, the Welsh Government’s report, which will steer future policy, concludes that “people of ethnic minority background in Wales face barriers created by exclusions and racism”.
The conclusions of the report have been criticised by Andrew RT Davies, leader of the Welsh Conservatives, who said: “This kind of outdated virtue signalling nonsense is completely out of touch with the needs of the people of Wales.
“Labour is stuck on yesterday’s thinking, the kind that is being roundly rejected globally. Time to turf them out.”
A Welsh Government spokesman said: “We are committed to creating an anti-racist nation by 2030. Our Anti-racist Wales Action Plan is built on the values of anti-racism and calls for zero tolerance of all racial inequality.”
