Green spaces and playing fields are the beating heart of any community. Whether you live in a dense city or in the middle of the countryside, fields provide a safe place for team sports, for talent to be nurtured, for confidence to be built and for your children and teenagers to let off steam. For people of any age, fields provide spaces for sports days, fêtes and the kind of events that hold communities together. Playing fields are not a luxury. They are a vital component of any healthy and happy community.

The sad truth is that, over the years, thousands of playing fields have been lost to development, and many more are under threat today. For more than eighty years, the Fields in Trust charity has been working hard to combat this threat by protecting playing fields across the United Kingdom, improving their facilities and encouraging their use. There has never been a greater need for their work.

I am therefore delighted to announce an ambitious project that hopes to save hundreds of playing fields – potentially forever – across the country. The objective of this exciting programme is simple to state, but no doubt harder to achieve: 2,012 playing fields across the UK protected by the year 2012.

The year 2012 marks The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. I cannot think of a more fitting tribute to my Grandmother’s 60 glorious years on The Throne than to dedicate to The Queen this programme that will save playing fields for future generations. The newly protected fields will be called ‘The Queen Elizabeth II Fields’; in Scotland , ‘The Queen Elizabeth Fields’. The Fields will form a lasting legacy of The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. On a personal note, I sincerely hope that these Fields will become a living reminder to all of The Queen’s steadfast duty, dedication and love for this country.

This project is particularly relevant given the other landmark occasion scheduled for 2012 – the London Olympics. The Games will herald a decade of major sporting events to be held in the United Kingdom. The question is: where will our sporting stars of the future come from if we continue to lose access to these important grassroots facilities?

The Queen Elizabeth II Fields challenge is ambitious but much needed. It will require the support of sporting bodies, local authorities and, most importantly, the British people in local communities up and down the country. I am certain the Fields will bring lasting benefit to countless individual lives. Being able to play outdoors is a basic right of childhood. The Queen Elizabeth II Fields will guarantee that millions more children are able to enjoy that right both now and in the future.

As Fields in Trust are proud to say, please play on the grass!