The richest farmers will not be able to apply for post-Brexit nature funding under plans for England being considered by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra).
Farming groups and climate experts have warned that such a plan would “leave farmers in the cold” and make it more difficult for the UK to reach net zero by 2050.
The environment secretary, Steve Reed, this week announced that the sustainable farming incentive (SFI), which pays farmers for making space for nature on their land, would be paused and reformed before June’s spending review. The scope of the scheme – and its budget – are being reassessed.
The SFI is part of a package of payments that replaced the EU’s common agricultural policy and paid land managers for the amount of land in their care, with the aim of paying farmers to look after nature, soil and other public goods, rather than simply for farming and owning land.
The Guardian understands that the view in the department is that the scheme is now too wide and gets spent too quickly. Rather than being assessed on merit, payments are “first come, first served”, meaning farms with agents to fill out documents have an advantage in accessing funding. It also means many productive farms use up the funding by doing things such as leaving grassy margins and scattering wild birdseed. Ministers believe the money could be better spent on farms that are less well-off but more rich in nature, which could make a more positive difference to the environment.
Daniel Zeichner, the farming minister, told parliament on Wednesday: “The schemes that we inherited had no way of prioritising properly; it was a first-come, first-served scheme. I was very clear when I took over that we would not immediately overturn the existing system; we wanted to give people confidence about the future. However, when we come to redesign the scheme, we can design it better to address [these] issues.”
Defra sources confirmed they were exploring plans to make it a more targeted scheme, meaning the farms that make the most money would not be able to apply.
This is likely to be just the latest measure to be unpopular with farmers, after the government introduced an inheritance tax on agricultural land in the autumn budget and this week announced plans to give Natural England the power to compulsorily buy farmland. A report published this week shows that farmers’ income has not improved since the 1970s.
Tom Bradshaw, the president of the National Farmers’ Union, said: “My big fear is the transition was sold as an opportunity for all farmers. Now it feels like it’s going to be much more targeted in its delivery, leaving some farms in the cold.
“A wider scheme means people can move up the scale and be more ambitious; making it more targeted would mean some farmers won’t be able to get on the ladder and start delivering for nature.
“We want to work with Defra to develop the detail of this, but our position has been there should be funds available for every farmer who wants to contribute to nature.”
after newsletter promotion
However, some believe that – if implemented correctly – this could be a positive move. Lucy Pegg, political adviser at the thinktank Green Alliance, said: “The farming budget is crucial to Britain’s stability and security, so must be protected. But when budgets are tight, it is right that funding is directed towards the lowest-paid farmers, who cannot make a profit from food production alone.
“Often these farmers also have the biggest role to play in protecting the environment and it is right their work reducing flood risk, creating carbon-storing habitats and protecting beloved wildlife is supported by government.”
Tom Lancaster, head of land, food and farming at the Energy and Climate Information Unit, said: “The evidence points to the fact that you can’t meet legally binding nature and water targets without a widely available scheme like the SFI.
“Many of the low-carbon farming methods included in the seventh carbon budget advice [from the Climate Change Committee] may also lean on the SFI. The key thing for Defra now is not to restrict the availability of the scheme, but to better target the options in the scheme. This could include putting caps on certain options that have absorbed too much of the funding so far and that are likely to deliver questionable value for money.”
