Key facts
- Wales has given more than £4 million to Size of Wales since 2015, including £350,000 for the current financial year.
- The charity's Mbale program had planted 25 million trees in Uganda as of 2025, according to the report.
- The Welsh government said the decision is 'not a judgement on the quality of the work.'
- Reform UK's Helen Jenner welcomed the move, calling the spending 'ridiculous woke spending.'
The Welsh government will stop funding a tree-planting program in Uganda run by climate charity Size of Wales after the current grant ends on March 31, 2027, ministers said on November 6, 2026. A spokesperson said budgetary pressures required 'difficult decisions' and that the move was 'not a judgement on the quality of the work.'
Wales has given more than £4 million to Size of Wales since 2015, including £350,000 for the current financial year. The charity works with Indigenous communities around Mbale in the Mount Elgon region of eastern Uganda, where 25 million trees had been planted as of 2025, according to the report. A Welsh government document published in August 2025 said the work helped some of the world's poorest people adapt to climate change and protected locals from deadly landslides.
The decision drew praise from right-wing parties in the Senedd and criticism from left-wing ones. Reform UK's leader in Wales, Helen Jenner, welcomed the move and said her party had called 'for an end to this ridiculous woke spending for years now.' Welsh Conservative leader Darren Millar called it 'long overdue' and said the money should go to Welsh public services. Welsh Liberal Democrats leader Jane Dodds called the decision 'short-sighted,' saying Size of Wales had planted millions of trees and built links between Wales and Uganda. Welsh Labour leader Ken Skates accused Plaid Cymru of doing the opposite of what it champions in opposition.
The Welsh government also gives Size of Wales £280,000 a year for an education program in Welsh schools that runs until the end of March 2027.