Our Team
Jeremy Iles, GFA Founder & Director
Jeremy started “doing something useful” as a teenager and has kept to this ethos throughout his career.
1983-84: Cycle campaigner at Friends of the Earth
1984-1990: First Director of the London Wildlife Trust
1991-93: Country Director VSO Bangladesh and Eritrea
1994-2000: Regional Manager Sustrans
2000 – 2016: CEO of the Federation of City Farms and Community Gardens. Projects and partnerships during this period have had a significant and long lasting impact nationally, including the Allotments Regeneration Initiative (2002-2014), the £57m Local Food Consortium (2002-2014), Community Land Advisory Service, and chairing the Growing Together partnership (2014-16).
2016 – present: Director Green Future Associates CIC
2020 – present: Instigator and joint coordinator Urban Agriculture Consortium
2022 – 2025: Oral History of the Environmental Movement
BA Hons, Sussex, NVQ5 (Management), School for Social Entrepreneurs (2019).
Jeremy rides his bike to his allotment, sings with The Island Folk, plays octave mandola with the All at Sea Ceilidh Band, and runs Stan Drew’s Folk club in Bristol. Jeremy is a qualified Yachtmaster exam and sailing instructor.
Maddy Longhurst
Maddy has been coordinating the Urban Agriculture Consortium with Jeremy since 2020. Maddy’s previous work focus has been campaigning for the protection of land within the planning system (Founder of Blue Finger Alliance, Bristol). She also works on low-cost and free thermal imaging surveys to provide householders with data to inform housing retrofit as Survey Manager of The C.H.E.E.S.E Project CIC – Cold Homes Energy Efficiency Survey Experts. She is also helping to create the organisational infrastructure for the Tiny House Community Bristol, enabling the creation of common good regenerative settlements in the West of England using dynamic governance.
Clients and Project Funding
- The Watershed Bristol (2024-25): research contract into Bristol’s greenbelt.
- Coventry University: work on Landed Community Kitchens and Pathways to Agroecological Urbanism.
- Sustain: Food for the Planet (grant).
- Nottinghamshire County Council (2023): feasibility study into FarmStarts.
- Groundwork UK: (2021) advice to grants programme.
- University of the West of England (2019): guidance and training on careers in the NGO and environmental sectors.
- Humanists UK (2018): feasibility study into natural burial grounds as social enterprise. “Strongly recommended.”
- City to Sea: (2017-19): Strategic consultancy and fundraising for campaign to combat plastic pollution. “Great teamwork“
- Horfield and District Allotments Association (2017-18): Delivering a 100th anniversary community and oral history project. “Beyond our expectations.”
- Big Lottery Fund (2016-17): Strategic consultancy on future local food funding. “Very useful.“
Funders of the Urban Agriculture Consortium, managed by GFA. Thanks to Esmee Fairbairn Foundation, Plunkett Foundation, Necessity, The Lund Trust.
