Rural policing

Being such a rural area brings unique challenges for the force. We have to take things into account that other forces may take for granted such as distance to travel to incidents and the nature of the communities we safeguard. It also means that we have the lowest crime in England and Wales as well as the ability to put communities at the heart of what we do.

We have several schemes in place to provide relevant crime prevention advice such as Farmwatch and Horse watch.

We also work closely with the Countryside council of Wales and have a dedicated wildlife crime officer.

Rural policing strategy

All the work we’re doing to improve the way we safeguard our rural communities is brought together in our new Rural Policing Strategy.

It has been developed in consultation with the farmers unions, various community groups, charities and other people who have expressed an interest in policing rural areas.

It focuses on four areas - prevention, intelligence, enforcement and reassurance. Each topic has a list of things that will be done, and include crime prevention packs with information on what people can do to keep themselves and their property safe; better use of watch schemes like Farmwatch and Neighbourhood Watch; better use of social media and sharing more stories with the local media and the community directly; going to where people gather and speaking to them as well as having meetings in the offices of local businesses, groups and farming unions and better use of new mobile police stations.

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