Natural Capital Community Partnerships Adviser

Introduction

Community Land Scotland is recruiting an Adviser as part of our new Natural Capital Community Partnerships team (NCCP).

The Natural Capital Community Partnerships (NCCP) project launched at the beginning of 2025 to build partnerships between Scotland’s community, private and public sectors. Led by Community Land Scotland in partnership with the Scottish Land Commission, the project is helping deliver Scottish Government expectations that communities are involved in decisions and benefit from Scotland’s land.

The Scottish Government’s Natural Capital Market Framework sets out its expectations for responsible, high-integrity private investment to address the twin crises of climate change and biodiversity loss. This includes an expectation that investment in, and use of Scotland’s natural capital should create benefits that are shared between public, private and community interests, contributing to a just transition.

The Natural Capital Community Partnerships project brings together a wide range of stakeholders to help support the practical delivery of the Natural Capital Market Framework. It aims to ensure the investment in natural capital required to address the twin crises is managed in a fair and just way, and that the communities affected share in the benefits it delivers.

Job Details

Hours: Full time (37.5 hours per week)
Contract length: The role is funded to 31 March 2028
Location: Flexible, subject to agreement, must be in Scotland
Reporting to: Natural Capital Community Partnerships Manager
Closing date: 12:00 on Monday 19 January 2026
Interview date: Wednesday 28 January 2026 in Glasgow

Natural Capital Community Partnerships

The Scottish Government is committed to using Scotland’s land to address the twin crises of climate change and biodiversity loss but recognises that there are a wide range of stakeholders impacted by land use change and that the benefits and risks from such changes needs to be shared fairly.

The Natural Capital Community Partnerships team provides on the ground practical support to landowners, investors and communities to build relationships and partnerships to ensure the benefits of investment in, and use of natural capital are shared proportionately and fairly.

The Natural Capital Community Partnerships team:

• Develop relationships and productive collaboration between local communities, landowners, developers and nature finance investors to deliver socially just natural capital investments across Scotland.
• Provide practical on-the-ground support for all parties to agree community benefits from natural capital investment. This process is guided by the Scottish Land Commission’s Community benefits from natural capital investment: Route Map
• Work closely with a broad range of stakeholders to share learning and increase the impact of the project across relevant sectors.
• Develop, test and share learning from case studies that seek to increase community benefits and community wealth building outcomes from natural capital developments and nature finance, guided by Scottish Government’s Natural Capital Market Framework and the Scottish Land Commission’s Guidance on Delivering Community Benefits from Land and Community benefits from natural capital investment: Route Map.
• Work across a range of types of natural capital projects and with a broad range of stakeholders to ensure all types of landowners and natural capital projects are considered.

The funders supporting the project are Esmee Fairbairn Foundation, Foundation Scotland, Highlands and Islands Enterprise, Scottish Forestry and South of Scotland Enterprise. The project is also working in collaboration with the Scottish Land Commission, Cairngorm National Park Authority and Loch Lomond & The Trossachs National Park.

The Natural Capital Community Partnerships project is supported by the Natural Capital & Community Benefits Partnership Board comprising a range of organisations.

The Natural Capital Community Partnerships team is supported by Community Land Scotland’s Director of Communities and Operations. The Natural Capital Community Partnerships team currently includes a manager and two advisers – one with a focus on nature finance and one covering the South of Scotland. Community Land Scotland are currently recruiting an additional adviser to increase the team to four. In addition, we are recruiting to replace the manager who has recently moved role to become our Director of Communities and Operations.

About the role

The role of the Natural Capital Community Partnerships Adviser is to support communities with natural capital projects and work with developers, landowners and investors. The key responsibilities for this role are:

• Raise awareness and generate good practice in delivering community benefits from natural capital projects
• Collaborate and develop activities and agreements between communities, landowners and investors
• Actively promote the use of shared governance and asset ownership arrangements where appropriate to increase community agency in decision making over land use change arising from natural capital developments
• Contribute to the development of national policy on community benefits from nature finance
• Develop effective relationships with local and specialist stakeholders, including third sector intermediaries, to support the delivery of the team’s objectives that will result in an increased impact of the project, looking for communication opportunities to increase the impact of and reach of the project
• Work with NCCP team members to strengthen relationships among funders, stakeholders, community intermediaries, government bodies, landowners, and the nature finance sector across Scotland
• Develop and share case studies and best practice protocols
• Help to build relationships with the media and identify appropriate stories for media coverage in the South of Scotland
• Work collaboratively with Community Land Scotland colleagues to ensure the work of the Natural Capital Community Partnerships team contributes to the policy and operational objectives of the organisation
• Any other tasks as identified by Community Land Scotland