Defra has announced £3 million of funding for a new National Centre for Environmental Horticulture Plant Health, to be delivered jointly by the Royal Horticultural Society and the Animal and Plant Health Agency. According to the department, the centre will research existing and emerging threats to gardens and other green spaces, and develop ways to reduce their impact. The model is intended to be practical rather than site-based. Defra says the centre will operate virtually through staff working across APHA and RHS locations, with findings to be shared with industry and used by growers, retailers and home gardeners.
The government is presenting the initiative as both a biosecurity measure and an economic one. Defra says the work is intended to help protect the UK's 23 million gardens and support an environmental horticulture trade that, on industry figures cited in the announcement, contributes £38 billion to UK GDP and supports 722,000 jobs. That framing matters because plant health policy is not limited to specialist producers. Problems affecting ornamental plants and garden stock can move through supply chains, affect public and private green spaces, and increase costs for businesses and households that rely on healthy planting.
According to Defra, the centre will work with industry and other partners to decide priorities by likely impact, then move from research into management practice and published advice. The stated purpose is to identify where threats are most serious, test responses and turn scientific evidence into guidance that can be used in day-to-day horticulture. For policy readers, the important point is that the announcement focuses on research, prioritisation and advice rather than new statutory controls. The centre is being set up as a delivery mechanism within existing plant health policy, bringing together government science, a major membership body and commercial horticulture.
The threat profile set out in the announcement is broad. Defra highlights Bemisia tabaci, an insect capable of transmitting highly damaging plant diseases; Phytophthora species, which the RHS describes as one of its most reported plant health problems; and Rose Rosette virus, a pathogen that can be fatal to roses. The RHS also says that, based on enquiries to its gardening advice service, honey fungus and phytophthora root rots were among the most prevalent plant health problems seen in gardens in 2025. Combining official plant health expertise with evidence from routine gardening enquiries is meant to give the sector a clearer picture of which risks are already established and which may be developing.
In remarks published with the announcement, Defra Chief Plant Health Officer Professor Nicola Spence said climate change and globalisation are increasing the range and diversity of threats to plants. The government's position is that plant biosecurity can no longer be treated as a static issue, because changing conditions and international trade can alter both exposure and spread. APHA Chief Executive Richard Lewis described the partnership as part of the agency's continuing role in protecting borders and maintaining biosecurity. RHS Director of Science and Collections Professor Alistair Griffiths said the collaboration would connect scientific research with practical horticultural expertise, with the aim of supporting a sector that delivers economic, environmental and wellbeing benefits.
The announcement also gives the RHS a defined public-facing role. Defra says the society will draw on its 600,000 members to raise awareness of biosecurity and help track national priorities across both professional horticulture and home gardening. That extends plant health communication beyond inspection and enforcement into public behaviour, purchasing decisions and routine garden management. Defra says the centre aligns with the Plant Biosecurity Strategy for Great Britain 2023 to 2028 and supports the government's growth mission through investment in innovation and technology. The announcement was made during Plant Health Week, which runs from 11 to 17 May. For growers, retailers, green-space managers and household gardeners, the immediate significance is a new route for plant health evidence and practical advice at a time when climate risk and trade exposure are becoming harder to separate from everyday horticulture.