Select committee: Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee
Recommendation 12
Second Report - Environmental Land Management and the agricultural transition
Published 28 Oct 2021
Paragraph 73
Addressed to Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs
Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee Environmental Land Management and the agricultural transition All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
A degree of simplicity may be necessary in order to achieve high SFI uptake, and we acknowledge that an approach based on specific actions and parcels of land will work for many farmers. However, Defra should not miss opportunities to also support a more ambitious whole-farm approach to delivering public goods. This could also help farmers produce food both more sustainably and more competitively, by making the best use of their land and reducing costs. Alongside the parcel-based actions within the SFI, Defra should set out a plan to support public goods delivery at the whole-farm level, including using the pilot phase of SFI to evaluate the merits of including a whole-farm standard in the scheme.
From: Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, Second Report - Environmental Land Management and the agricultural transition (HC 78), paragraph 73, 28 October 2021
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 20 January 2022 (deadline 28 December 2021).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The Government welcomes the Committee's report and says it "strongly agrees" that the agricultural transition must work for farmers and contribute to environmental objectives, while declining some specific recommendations.
- On the phasing out of Direct Payments, the Government says it is "not planning to change the profile of Direct Payments reductions", stating that suggesting otherwise would create "unnecessary and unhelpful uncertainty".
- On the budget, it will honour the £2.4 billion annual commitment to 2024/25 but is "unable to commit" beyond that, as future budgets will be decided by future governments.
- On engagement, it agrees it "can and should do more" to explain how engagement has informed scheme design, and plans to increase engagement activity in 2022.
- On whole-farm standards, it does not mandate entering whole farms into the Sustainable Farming Incentive, citing challenges, but is "continuing to investigate" land management plans through the pilot.