Is there a commercial reality for trees on farms?

This post is greater than 6 months old - links may be broken or out of date. Proceed with caution!

By Abi Reader, Farmer, NFU Cymru Deputy President

Moving into agroforestry from conventional farming has been an interesting journey over the past 2 years. Two years earlier I would describe myself as a mixed farmer, mainly dairy, milking 200 cows, 150 acres arable crops (for livestock only), 100 sheep and approx 70 beef animals from the dairy herd.

Today I still describe myself as a farmer but we’ve got another iron in the fire - agroforestry. A chance meeting with a Richard Edwards, Land Economist and former forester, on social media led to an interesting conversation about a pilot agroforestry project that, if successful, could provide another source of income for the farm as well as doing our bit for climate change. In Wales growing trees on farms has become highly controversial. The limited messaging about what economic value trees can bring to farming businesses means uptake is understandably low. My aim for this pilot is to get proof of concept that trees can help to make a farming business like mine more resilient.

A site of approximately 1.2ha needed to be selected on the farm. I chose an area away from the dairy grazing platform to avoid compromising our core activity. I also selected a site in a slightly more awkward corner and on ground that only had limited value for arable. The reason for this is because the agroforestry project is a trial - there was no guarantee it would work and no funding to make up the income lost so I didn’t want to commit resources that were too valuable. Another factor that played into identifying the right site was not to plant on any rented ground since the landlord wouldn’t like it and there’s always the possibility we might lose the land before the pilot was completed. Finally due to the ownership of the farm being divided between 2 brothers (my father and uncle) I needed to make sure the planting was on my side of the inheritance line (for those of you familiar with on farm succession this was a very complicated conversation).

There were a few different things that tempted me to give this a go. The trees we planted - cherry, willow, aspen and lime - are very fast growing and once established could be coppiced every 3-4 years so it’s not too long to wait for a return. These trees have been planted at a very high density approx 3750 trees in 0.6ha. The remaining 0.6ha is to be planted with a novel ‘arable’ crop called Sida Hermaphrodita. This crop is equally fast growing, can be harvested twice a year, and is very high in protein so could be fed to animals and, if they decide they like it, and it agrees with their digestive system, then it has the potential to replace some or all the soya in our dairy cow diet. Since we can’t grow soya very well in the UK, let alone Wales (there’s less than 1000 acres grown in UK) and soya is under much scrutiny, this could be a big win. Probably the most exciting thing for me was none of us really knew how we would harvest and store the sida to feed to the cows so we were walking into the unknown. Some out of the experimental thinking sounded like it would be fun!!
The sida and the trees all have an excellent ability to sequester carbon in their roots and help get that carbon deep into the soil. This is a great bonus on top of the potential income from the above ground biomass, which in the case of the trees would be turned into valuable biochar and sold, or spread on the farmland to enhance its composition, or in the case of sida fed to cows or turned into biochar.

So those are the good bits. The limitations to date have been varied. They do not make me regret starting the pilot but I have yet to be convinced it will work commercially. What I think is really important is what I have learnt so far about all this because if farmers are going to be urged to plant more trees we need to understand what the pinch points are. My feedback needs to be taken in the constructive manner it is meant. Planting the trees was an eye opener. They turned up on farm in some bags on a small pallet, I’m not sure where from and I certainly didn’t know which variety was which, I still don’t. Then came the digging of 3750 holes to plant them. This was done in 2 hits but was very time consuming and done on a budget so very difficult to allocate staff time to do it. The pressure was on to fit planting in between milking and feeding. Rather than getting a good start on the day it was really only the hours between midday and 2pm that worked and that wasn’t sufficient. This meant relying on others to plant the trees, which led me to feel very detached from it all. A farmer likes to feel one with the land, the landscape, the animals and the crops. We rear and nurture them - the rearing is the rewarding part. My own cows are descended from both sets of grandparents and I’ve got photos of cows and calves all over my phone, they bring me a lot of joy.

The sida in particular has been complicated. It’s not native to the UK, it comes from Poland. Brexit made it difficult to get the seeds into the country, and the limited understanding of its agronomy has made it difficult to get successful establishment. 2 years into the trial and we’ve only just begun planting seed at the site so fingers crossed it works. There’s a possibility the best establishment will be via planting rooted crops.
The droughts of 2022 and 2023 hit the trees hard. 75% survived but their growth has been severely checked.
Finally the land has been out of production for 2 years, bringing in no income. Because there’s no income it’s very difficult to justify any time at the site.
So what does the future hold? This is a pilot, pilots come with all sorts of problems but I remain hopeful it will work. If we can get proof of concept these pinch points I have identified can hopefully be resolved and we will have a blueprint for other farmers. If it works, we can deliver on both a diversified income for farmers that’s not too dissimilar to their core businesses, as well as and making a meaningful contribution to Net Zero.

More from NFU Cymru