Farmers to get more cash to fund nature protection and sustainable food production

Farming minister, Mark Spencer, has announced that by 2027-8 farmers and landowners will receive increased payments for protecting and enhancing nature and delivering sustainable food production under the government’s Environmental Land Management schemes.

The payments will come from through the Countryside Stewardship (CS) and the Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) schemes. Spencer also confirmed an expanded range of actions under the schemes, which farmers could be paid for, would be published soon.

Farmers’ payments could increase by £1,000 a year for taking nature-friendly action through the SFI. This new management payment will be made for the first 50ha of farm at £20/ha in an SFI agreement, to cover the administrative costs of participation.

The payments, according to Defra, could attract smaller businesses, many of whom are tenant farmers and currently under-represented in the scheme. SFI is already paying farmers to improve soil and moorlands, and an expanded set of standards for 2023 will be published shortly.

And 30,000 farmers across England currently in a CS agreement, will see an average increase of 10% to their revenue payment rates – covering ongoing activity such as habitat management. Defra is also updating capital payment rates, which cover one-off projects such as hedgerow creation, with an average increase of 48%.

It said the payments will constitute a “new, fairer farming system” to replace the European Union Common Agricultural Policy which no longer appliers in the UK. It will Defra claimed: “put money into farmers’ pockets and the wider rural economy based on actions taken to enhance nature and drive innovation in agriculture.”