Janet Hughes DEFRA Missing in action?

Bury the Trash · Mar 2, 2022

yellow belly said:
under current circumstances today there is no need for any payments from government due to the war in ukraine

without the war
the govements environmentle payment system would compete with farmers for land
land owners and land buyers are looking at entering all their land into schemes and leaving farm tenents with no business

in 3 months time all the above could be irelivent as every acre could be needed
the senario
would be no grain or very little coming out of the black sea
usa has a drought the wheat crop is suffering badly

we have to aply for the environmentle scheme in advance of knowing the planing conditions of the crop
if there is no fine for not applying the options when the food needed helps with putting a sustainable plan in place

Even without War for times forward there will be continuing volatility . Domestically and Internationally thats one thing we can be sure of.
I don't see my Landlords changing their way of managing good agricultural land , we manage and maintain it too well for them and also pay rent on time without them having any hassle or complicated extra bureaucracy ,win win win.
I cant see any change from them , nor will they be lowering their rents either

delilah · Mar 2, 2022

Fuzzy said:
What about farms who have no Permanent Pasture, No hedges, and No ditches, rivers or lakes ?????

Crack on and crop it.

edit: You will still see the money. What value of feed barley/ wheat/ straw does the arable farmer sell to the PP farmer ? The multiplier effect for £1 of ELMS is greatest if it is given to PP.

andybk · Mar 2, 2022

delilah said:
Crack on and crop it.

there are a few 700 cow dairies not far away or heading that way , any business that size (and i include dysons etc ) shouldnt need public money, except in odd sensitive corners that need looking after , agents are making a killing on those farms for managing the BPS , funding should be for small family farms to compete with the big cost cutters ,and protect their environmentally sensitive farming techniques .
no different to the huge super trawlers and the small family boats that cut out a living

delilah · Mar 2, 2022

andybk said:
there are a few 700 cow dairies not far away or heading that way , any business that size (and i include dysons etc ) shouldnt need public money

Hence the suggestion of weighted payments. Anyone farming their PP intensively, it wont be worth the paperwork to claim past the first 40Ha.

delilah · Mar 2, 2022

steveR said:
Ahhh, but if the money runs out, then all of a sudden, the imperative to keep it in grass, might disappear!

The money wouldn't run out. Defra know the Ha of PP in England. It is the only land use where they can accurately forecast what the likely take up would be and tailor payment rates accordingly.

steveR · Mar 2, 2022

delilah said:
The money wouldn't run out. Defra know the Ha of PP in England. It is the only land use where they can accurately forecast what the likely take up would be and tailor payment rates accordingly.

My comment was pitched more at a change of policy or political will, but we all know that at least with PP, a quick pass with a plough and back to the arable it goes... Tree are another matter!

willyorkshire · Mar 2, 2022

Fuzzy said:
What about farms who have no Permanent Pasture, No hedges, and No ditches, rivers or lakes ?????

We get nowt! Though a bit for soils element of SFI.
Carbon credits sales should be banned. Industries need to clean up not buy sequestered carbon. Just ludicrous.

delilah · Mar 2, 2022

willyorkshire said:
We get nowt! Though a bit for soils element of SFI.

What % of the English cereal and straw crop goes for cattle and sheep feed/bedding ? (ie the stock exposed to PP ) Lets say it's 25%, just for the discussion.
Whatever your annual cereals and straw sales income is, divide it by 4.
Is that number higher than what you will get from the soils element of the SFI ?
If it is, then you are better off if the money goes to the livestock farmer, for him/her to make it work harder for you.

willyorkshire · Mar 2, 2022

steveR said:
My comment was pitched more at a change of policy or political will, but we all know that at least with PP, a quick pass with a plough and back to the arable it goes... Tree are another matter!

delilah said:
What % of the English cereal and straw crop goes for cattle and sheep feed/bedding ? (ie the stock exposed to PP ) Lets say it's 25%, just for the discussion.
Whatever your annual cereals and straw sales income is, divide it by 4.
Is that number higher than what you will get from the soils element of the SFI ?
If it is, then you are better off if the money goes to the livestock farmer, for him/her to make it work harder for you.

Thanks for your comment. We chop all straw, can't risk getting blackgrass. Have ample poultry manure to add the nutrients. Seems to work as well as now gone pig unit muck and now gone duck unit muck. Problem now is the ridiculous spreading rules!

Janet Hughes Defra · Mar 3, 2022

devonbeef said:
Thank you for replying, is their somebody higher up at Defra that could comment?

Questions on overall policy direction and priorities, like this, are really for ministers and other politicians rather than civil servants, however senior they are - for political questions I'd have thought the best advice would be to contact your MP in the first instance, in their role as your representative at the political level

Janet Hughes Defra · Mar 3, 2022

BrianV said:
Funny because I understood that you said you & your compatriots are designing this scheme with ministers approval, maybe the time has come to stand up & make some fresh suggestions to them!

Officials advise, ministers decide, and then I and my team, along with delivery partners, are responsible for implementing what's decided. Yes I do have a lot of responsibility around detailed scheme design and delivery, within the policy set by the government of the day and always subject to decisions by ministers, and I and my team advise them on policy issues, but it's for them to decide and be accountable for those decisions and it's not for me as a civil servant to comment publicly on high level political or policy questions such as the one you asked.

I know that's not the answer you want, and I'm sorry about that - it's a judgement call, and I do try to make these calls in as helpful and transparent a way as I possibly can.

Jimdog1 · Mar 3, 2022

Janet Hughes Defra said:
Questions on overall policy direction and priorities, like this, are really for ministers and other politicians rather than civil servants, however senior they are - for political questions I'd have thought the best advice would be to contact your MP in the first instance, in their role as your representative at the political level

That would be great. Geoffrey Cox QC is my mp and I can tell you from experience that he does not even acknowledge letters let alone respond with an answer.

topground · Apr 4, 2022

topground said:
Two months on and no information about the numbers signing up for the SFI pilot. Why is that? @Janet Hughes Defra

Janet Hughes Defra said:
Hi there - we'll be publishing a blogpost about this, this month, and will share the numbers then

Assurances that a simple question about the numbers participating in the SFI pilot will be answered early next month have been given every month since early January.
Have I missed the blog post promised by the end of March revealing just how many signed up for the SFI pilot?
@Janet Hughes Defra
Since I received an email this morning from GOV.UK blogs probably not.
Funny how even self imposed deadlines dont seem to matter to DEFRA.

onesiedale · May 7, 2022

@Janet Hughes Defra
any updates please? with the SFI due to roll out next month please. Just wondering if DEFRA have considered the proposal put forward;

that an easy and fair quick fix to get the SFI off the ground payment of £200/ha could be made on the first 80 hectares of grassland.

Simple admin, simple verification, AND it ticks ALL of the environmental boxes for water quality, air quality, soil structure, carbon sequestration, public good and large participation

(I trust that this proposal has been discussed since it was first proposed late last year)

ajcc · May 7, 2022

topground said:
With the sign up deadline for the SFI pilot looming and with the level of suspicion surrounding the contract on offer I find it odd that there has been no sign of @Janet Hughes Defra since 7th October to answer questions.
If seems a strange time to abandon communication by DEFRA and even, heaven forbid Janet Hughes is indisposed, it should not be beyond the wit of DEFRA to put up a substitute.
Perhaps the questions all became a little too difficult and the scam and sham that is the SFI pilot has been exposed.

It could be the plan by the civil service is to blame the farmers for not cooperating with their elaborate charade when it was never workable.
Whatever the reason for two weeks of non engagement, in the words of Private Eye; ‘We should be told!’

This is the original post.....6 months past and anyone any the wiser?
Just playing lip service.

onesiedale · May 7, 2022

ajcc said:
This is the original post.....6 months past and anyone any the wiser?
Just playing lip service.

in fairness to @Janet Hughes Defra , she did contribute considerably to some threads in the New Year and leading into April.
However, it does seem strange that things have gone so quiet from DEFRA regarding the SFI .
You are right, we do need updates, above all just to confirm that the SFI/ELMS is still a cornerstone of DEFRA policy.
Secondly, we would like confirmation that our voices have been listened to please. (both on here and in the co-design projects,)

Against_the_grain · May 7, 2022

delilah said:
Ref the last few posts (and I make no apology for saying this on here over and over again as I believe it to be an important point ) there is one simple way in which Defra can meet all of their environmental objectives and simultaneously boost UK agricultural output. Limit area payments to PP.

How does PP provide any public good? If its poor land it wont be cropped and could be put into a scheme, if its good land it can be better used producing a product than doing nothing.

delilah · May 7, 2022

Against_the_grain said:
How does PP provide any public good? If its poor land it wont be cropped and could be put into a scheme, if its good land it can be better used producing a product than doing nothing.

Have a read of the evidence submitted to the PAC enquiry into ELMS.

https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index...mittee-enquiry-into-elms.360995/#post-7926461

onesiedale · May 7, 2022

Against_the_grain said:
How does PP provide any public good? If its poor land it wont be cropped and could be put into a scheme, if its good land it can be better used producing a product than doing nothing.

Grassland gives us probably 90% of the general publics recreation space in the countryside, along with their perception of what makes a 'green and pleasent landscape'
Add to that ; carbon sequestration, soil, air and water quality and of course food production, grassland is a win win win win scenario.
win for the public
win for DEFRA
win for the grassland farms, because they tend to be the smaller family units
win for the arable farms - because the shackles of the environmental obligations will be off them and they can produce for the market (a large part of that market being the family sized livestock farms which are predominantly grassland )

Against_the_grain · May 7, 2022

onesiedale said:
Grassland gives us probably 90% of the general publics recreation space in the countryside, along with their perception of what makes a 'green and pleasent landscape'
Add to that ; carbon sequestration, soil, air and water quality and of course food production, grassland is a win win win win scenario.
win for the public
win for DEFRA
win for the grassland farms, because they tend to be the smaller family units
win for the arable farms - because the shackles of the environmental obligations will be off them and they can produce for the market (a large part of that market being the family sized livestock farms which are predominantly grassland

This 'public recreation space' is actually on the whole private land which the public don't have free access to. If its a footpath its a footpath but that's different. The publics perception of what makes a green and pleasant landscape isnt a public good!

Carbon sequestration, is a wishy washy public good. Its a nicety, but doesn't actually benefit the UK public. It might tick the government's box in terms of moving to Net zero but it provides no substance. No-one is putting land down to pp if it has half a chance of being productive. A far greater good is sustianable uk food production which includes pp but not limited to.

Janet Hughes DEFRA Missing in action?

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Up to 25%

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50-75%

75-100%

100% I’ve had enough of farming!

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