“Radical” rhetoric of farming reform promising, but lack of details and urgency still puts nature at risk, says UK nature charities

“Radical” rhetoric of farming reform promising, but lack of details and urgency still puts nature at risk, says UK nature charities - The Wildlife Trusts

Today, the Government has announced further details on two new schemes for rewarding farmers in England for producing food sustainably, while supporting nature’s recovery and tackling climate change.

The Government says the Local Nature Recovery scheme “will pay farmers for locally-targeted actions which make space for nature” and is a more ambitious successor to the Countryside Stewardship scheme. The Landscape Recovery scheme will “support more radical changes to land-use change and habitat restoration.”

Following our disappointment at the announcement of the Sustainable Farming Incentive before Christmas, The Wildlife Trusts, National Trust, and RSPB welcome today’s commitment to ambitious environmental land management and radical landscape scale change, but are concerned the latest announcements are lacking clarity on how the schemes will work and achieve true integration of farming and nature.

The charities warn that time is running out for the Government to get farming reforms right to halt the decline of species by 2030 and tackle the worsening climate emergency.

Farming covers around 70% of the land in the UK, and the intensification and industrialisation of agriculture is the leading cause behind catastrophic declines of wildlife in recent decades.