Yesterday the Government published The Path to Sustainable Farming: An Agricultural Transition Plan 2021 to 2024.
By leaving the EU's Common Agricultural Policy, each nation of the UK now has the opportunity to do things differently. In England, the Government will support farmers to improve the environment, improve animal health and welfare, and reduce carbon emissions. The Government will support farmers to produce high quality food in a more sustainable way and improve transparency in the supply chain to help food producers strengthen their position at the farm gate and seek a fairer return from the marketplace. This will also help them to reduce their costs and improve their profitability, and help those who want to retire or leave the industry to do so with dignity, and to create new opportunities and support for new entrants coming into the industry.
I asked the Environment Secretary a question in yesterday's debate (which you can see here) - in reply he assured me that the new scheme will still support food production, and that the system is not designed to see land taken out of cultivation.
The centre piece of this future policy will be made up of three component parts. Elements of the new policy will be universally open to all farmers, while others will be more targeted. These include:
-The Sustainable Farming Incentive will pay for farmers for actions that they take to manage their land in an environmentally sustainable way.
-Local Nature Recovery will pay farmers for actions that support local nature recovery and deliver local environmental priorities.
-Landscape Recovery will support the delivery of landscape and ecosystem recovery through long-term, land use change projects.
This won’t be introduced overnight. Between 2021 and 2024, farmers can take part in the Environmental Land Management scheme, extending the Countryside Stewardship and Environmental Stewardship.
I am conscious that some aspects of the scheme are not yet published. This is because the precise details are intended to be worked out with farmers and their representatives in the coming months. I will continue to push for proper protections for our rural economy and I'm confident that together we can design a system that is better for farmers and the countryside, and fairer for taxpayers.