Privacy policy

Last updated: 21 October 2026

Who we are

The Future Economic Rural Network (FERN) is an independent think tank for the rural economy. FERN is the data controller for personal information collected through this website. You can contact us about privacy at info@fe-rn.org.

What we collect and why

Newsletter. If you sign up to the FERN newsletter we collect your email address so that we can send you new research, policy responses and FERNCast episodes, usually once a month. Our lawful basis is your consent. You can unsubscribe at any time by using the link in any newsletter or by emailing us.

Enquiries. If you contact us by email or through a form on this website we use the details you give us, such as your name, email address and message, to reply to you. Our lawful basis is our legitimate interest in responding to enquiries.

Website analytics. With your consent we use Google Analytics to understand how the site is used, for example which pages are read most. This uses cookies and collects information such as your approximate location, device and browser. See our cookie policy for details and how to change your choices.

Security. Our website security tools log technical information such as IP addresses to protect the site against attacks and abuse. Our lawful basis is our legitimate interest in keeping the website secure.

Embedded content

Some pages include content from other services, such as FERNCast episodes from Spotify. These services may collect information about you and set their own cookies under their own privacy policies.

Who we share it with

We do not sell personal information. We share it only with service providers that help us run the website and send email, such as our hosting, email and analytics providers, and only as needed for those purposes. Some providers may process data outside the UK; where they do, we rely on appropriate safeguards such as the UK’s adequacy regulations or standard contractual clauses.

How long we keep it

We keep newsletter subscriber details until you unsubscribe. We keep enquiry correspondence for as long as needed to deal with it and for a reasonable period afterwards, normally no longer than two years. Analytics data is retained in line with our analytics settings.

Your rights

Under UK data protection law you have the right to access the personal information we hold about you, to have it corrected or deleted, to object to or restrict its use, to data portability and to withdraw consent at any time. To exercise any of these rights, email info@fe-rn.org.

If you are unhappy with how we have handled your information you can complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) at ico.org.uk.

Changes to this policy

We may update this policy from time to time. The date at the top shows when it was last changed.