New figures have revealed that community ownership is on the increase in Scotland.

Scotland's Chief Statistician today published the Community Ownership in Scotland 2018 publication.

There were 593 assets in community ownership as of December 2018 owned by 429 community groups and with a total area of 209,810 hectares.

This represents 2.7% of the total land area of Scotland.

In 2018, 37 assets came into community ownership, an increase of 7% from 556 in 2017, comprising an additional 3,223 hectares.

There were 27 community groups which took ownership of assets for the first time in 2018.

While community ownership is widespread across Scotland, there is a large difference between the distribution of assets, the community groups that own them and their corresponding land area.

Over a third (38%) of assets and a similar proportion (39%) of community groups are located in two local authorities: Highland (142 assets owned by 111 groups) and Argyll and Bute (84 assets owned by 54 groups).

Na h-Eileanan Siar and Highland together contain 96.4% (202,174 hectares) of the land area in community ownership in Scotland.