Entry level schemes are there any new ones
- Thread starter jon9000
- Start date
Meadow Brown
Member
- Location
- Yorkshire
Hi
Yes there is a new scheme called CSS - not sure if it's relevant to mid tier level but you may have to register an interest in applying before 30th June this year.
Farmers Weekly article.
Countryside Stewardship Schemes
The new CSS starts in 2016, providing extra funding. Its “mid” tier agreements are competitive, so not everyone will be successful.
“Higher” tier agreements are expected to be offered by invitation to farms in designated areas or that have existing HLS agreements.
Farmers can apply from July and should start thinking about how to take advantage.
Yes there is a new scheme called CSS - not sure if it's relevant to mid tier level but you may have to register an interest in applying before 30th June this year.
Farmers Weekly article.
Countryside Stewardship Schemes
The new CSS starts in 2016, providing extra funding. Its “mid” tier agreements are competitive, so not everyone will be successful.
“Higher” tier agreements are expected to be offered by invitation to farms in designated areas or that have existing HLS agreements.
Farmers can apply from July and should start thinking about how to take advantage.
Ramrod
Member
- Location
- Skendleby Psalter, Lincolnshire
I thought it was to be called NELS
- Location
- Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk
They called it NELMS whilst they tried to think of a 'new' name and then decided to reuse the old one. 'If it ain't broke don't fix it' springs to mind
orchard Farm
Member
- Location
- Kent
What sort of money are we talking per ha ? It it worth getting involved ?
Thanks
Thanks
It will be on a points based system, like HLS. ELS had the average of 30 points/ha. This has no standard as such - it pays as you go. There is Mid Tier, Higher Tier & Capital Grants.
Don't forget that you will need EFA area in addition to your stewardship scheme. What used to be ELS is now basically greening, i.e. hedges, buffer strips, field corners.
Read this: https://www.gov.uk/government/colle...ip-get-paid-for-environmental-land-management
Don't forget that you will need EFA area in addition to your stewardship scheme. What used to be ELS is now basically greening, i.e. hedges, buffer strips, field corners.
Read this: https://www.gov.uk/government/colle...ip-get-paid-for-environmental-land-management
orchard Farm
Member
- Location
- Kent
Thanks
- Location
- Lincolnshire
Been to a meeting back in June and last Friday a lady from Nafural England phoned me up to arrange a one to one meeting for an hour to discuss options for our farm.
I politely declined the offer as from what I could see at the meeting in June the scheme was too complex and for what its worth on our small acreage it was not going to be worth the hassle, time, expensive seed mixes, mapping complications etc.
But I am leaving the ELS grass margins next to watercourses on the arable and counting them as part of my basic EFA. We have extensively grazed livestock anyway, so we aren't doing too bad environmentally even without a scheme.
Feels like a weight off my shoulders really. Flexibility to manage things how I like, rather than over prescriptive rules. Yes, I'm turning down maybe £1500 but out of that would have come a fair amount of expenses not least time and cost establishing and managing the options. I certainly won't miss having to grow undersown spring cereals for 5 years in a row.
I politely declined the offer as from what I could see at the meeting in June the scheme was too complex and for what its worth on our small acreage it was not going to be worth the hassle, time, expensive seed mixes, mapping complications etc.
But I am leaving the ELS grass margins next to watercourses on the arable and counting them as part of my basic EFA. We have extensively grazed livestock anyway, so we aren't doing too bad environmentally even without a scheme.
Feels like a weight off my shoulders really. Flexibility to manage things how I like, rather than over prescriptive rules. Yes, I'm turning down maybe £1500 but out of that would have come a fair amount of expenses not least time and cost establishing and managing the options. I certainly won't miss having to grow undersown spring cereals for 5 years in a row.
You aren't the only one to think like this. The penalties are draconian for what we are being offered in return!
I can see a lot of farmers not bothering with CS as EFAs will take up most of what we used to get ELS money for. If I didn't have a boss with a love of shooting I wouldn't bother either.
I agree, looks very complex and I don't like things that are too prescriptive but do the payments equate to so much a ha or not? If so how much? I too have plenty of margins not in my EFA so seems a shame not to use them.
You can double claim but the payments are scaled back. Unlike ELS there is no £30/ha fixed payment. Points mean prizes. The handbooks have the details on what options have what money/ha or metre.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/countryside-stewardship-manual-print-version
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/countryside-stewardship-manual-print-version
- Location
- Lincolnshire.
I very much agree with the above. Scheme far too complex for money on offer.
- Location
- Lincolnshire
Yes as far as I can remember it wasn't a flat rate, but a feature by feature point accumulation.
All gets very messy with overlaps into EFA, temporary/permanent grass problems and all that malarkey.
I might mess around with a nectar mix on some fallow land under my own steam, and maybe a bit of bird cover which might help the shooters, but if it goes wrong I can spray it off and put the discs over it without having to ring somebody up and beg for permission or risk a fine.
I might mow my watercourse buffers while the grass is still young enough to have some nutritional value, as the Badgers get all the ground nesting birds anyway. I might spray them for pernicious weeds if necessary. if tree falls down on the buffer strip Inwant to be able to saw it for firewood so it doesn't get in the combine, rather than have to leave it there for woodpeckers or something. (Not joking). That sort of thing, flexibility and playing it by ear.
That's how I roll. Don't like bureaucratic strait jackets.
All gets very messy with overlaps into EFA, temporary/permanent grass problems and all that malarkey.
I might mess around with a nectar mix on some fallow land under my own steam, and maybe a bit of bird cover which might help the shooters, but if it goes wrong I can spray it off and put the discs over it without having to ring somebody up and beg for permission or risk a fine.
I might mow my watercourse buffers while the grass is still young enough to have some nutritional value, as the Badgers get all the ground nesting birds anyway. I might spray them for pernicious weeds if necessary. if tree falls down on the buffer strip Inwant to be able to saw it for firewood so it doesn't get in the combine, rather than have to leave it there for woodpeckers or something. (Not joking). That sort of thing, flexibility and playing it by ear.
That's how I roll. Don't like bureaucratic strait jackets.
firsttimefarmer
Member
Must say we are looking at not re applying this year for the exact same reasons as above. We are another fairly small size and in order to get the money it seems excessive what land we have to give up!!!
The cynic in me says it just happens to coincide with lower commodity prices, again............
