Defra now looking at capping SFI

[DrWazzock]

But capping goes against the idea of reducing overheads and of joining up worthwhile tracts of land area into contiguous landscape scale schemes?
On 200 acres, the overheads for RT and all the bollox that goes with it are airesdy high per acre of crop. If I reduce cropped area by half they get even bigger per acre. If I put the whole small farm in schemes then the overhead associated with cropping disappears completely. If only put half the farm in schemes I create another significant overhead in the admin needed to run the schemes.
So I hope they think about this with any calling they might consider. Most likely same scenario applies to big farms as well. If you going to get a harvest gang set up then the more acres they cover the cheaper the set up overhead becomes, so better to either ditch arable completely or carry on 100%. I can’t see pissing about with a bit of both helping very much with efficiencies.

 

[topground]

why a FOI ?

in last weeks webinar they clearly stated 9000 active agreements and 1 million ha so far

i don’t think these numbers are secret ?

Civil servants also told the Environment Food and Rural Affairs Select committee that 1000 farms had signed up for the SFI Pilot when the true number was 842. I don’t know about you but if I am expecting 1000 litres of heating oil and only 842 turn up I am not pleased.
The figures quoted to the peasants on the webinar are part of the ongoing propaganda exercise mounted by DEFRA at taxpayers expense and should not be trusted anymore than anything else they spew out.
The days of civil servants telling the truth are long gone, at least with FOI or better still a Parliamantary Question they are less likely to lie.
My money is on the scheme being under subscribed and the 70% target for uptake not being met and that the realisation that paying farmers to take land out of food production given the current state of world affairs is madness. This might just be dawning dawning on our thick politicians and Spencer’s weasel words indicate that they they are planning to revisit the scheme because they know the public will not accept rising food prices while farmers are being paid to grow wild flowers.
What better way to justify reining back on the scheme than blaming farmers for taking up the scheme in accordance with the rules as set out by DEFRA.
DEFRA are always years behind the curve. Let’s revisit this thread in a years time and see if Janet Hughes has collected her Damehood or has been shifted sideways to screw up another industry.

 

[Clive]

Civil servants also told the Environment Food and Rural Affairs Select committee that 1000 farms had signed up for the SFI Pilot when the true number was 842. I don’t know about you but if I am expecting 1000 litres of heating oil and only 842 turn up I am not pleased.
The figures quoted to the peasants on the webinar are part of the ongoing propaganda exercise mounted by DEFRA at taxpayers expense and should not be trusted anymore than anything else they spew out.
The days of civil servants telling the truth are long gone, at least with FOI or better still a Parliamantary Question they are less likely to lie.
My money is on the scheme being under subscribed and the 70% target for uptake not being met and that the realisation that paying farmers to take land out of food production given the current state of world affairs is madness and it is dawning on politicians and they are planning to revisit the scheme because they know the public will not accept rising food prices while farmers are being paid to grow wild flowers. DEFRA are always years behind the curve. Let’s revisit this thread in a years time and see if Janet Hughes has collected her Damehood or has been shifted sideways to screw up another industry.

if under subscribed why would anyone be talking about capping or worrying about too much land going out of food production ?

your post is contradictory ?

 

[topground]

if under subscribed why would anyone be talking about capping or worrying about too much land going out of food production ?

your post is contradictory ?

Read what Spencer said.
It’s nothing to do with how much land is taken out of production or how many are in the scheme. They need a way of back pedalling on the scheme.
When the message that farmers are being paid to grow wild flowers and not produce food hits the news media there will be public outrage.
Stick a note in your diary and we will revisit this a years time.

 

[lloyd]

Read what Spencer said.
It’s nothing to do with how much land is taken out of production or how many are in the scheme. They need a way of back pedalling on the scheme.
When the message that farmers are being paid to grow wild flowers and not produce food hits the news media there will be public outrage.
Stick a note in your diary and we will revisit this a years time.

Especially when they see some of the pictures of the wild flowers not
looking quite as pretty as expected.

 

[Right-arm fast]

But capping goes against the idea of reducing overheads and of joining up worthwhile tracts of land area into contiguous landscape scale schemes?
On 200 acres, the overheads for RT and all the bollox that goes with it are airesdy high per acre of crop. If I reduce cropped area by half they get even bigger per acre. If I put the whole small farm in schemes then the overhead associated with cropping disappears completely. If only put half the farm in schemes I create another significant overhead in the admin needed to run the schemes.
So I hope they think about this with any calling they might consider. Most likely same scenario applies to big farms as well. If you going to get a harvest gang set up then the more acres they cover the cheaper the set up overhead becomes, so better to either ditch arable completely or carry on 100%. I can’t see pissing about with a bit of both helping very much with efficiencies.

My thoughts exactly. You just need to get the fixed costs down. Problem is when the 3 year agreement is up and Defra have stopped SFI and you have to start farming again with out any kit and labour on a weed infested farm. Just looking on the bright side

 

[Clive]

Read what Spencer said.
It’s nothing to do with how much land is taken out of production or how many are in the scheme. They need a way of back pedalling on the scheme.
When the message that farmers are being paid to grow wild flowers and not produce food hits the news media there will be public outrage.
Stick a note in your diary and we will revisit this a years time.

is that a bad message for media ? i don’t think so when the previous scheme was that wealthy landowners were paid for simply owning land !

i don’t think there will be public outrage ……. quite the opposite in fact

 

[willyorkshire]

is that a bad message for media ? i don’t think so when the previous scheme was that wealthy landowners were paid for simply owning land !

i don’t think there will be public outrage ……. quite the opposite in fact

If you remember, they decoupled payments, so in fact they made it look like landowners were paid for owning land. It was political goal post moving and now they're at it again.

 

[4course]

Read what Spencer said.
It’s nothing to do with how much land is taken out of production or how many are in the scheme. They need a way of back pedalling on the scheme.
When the message that farmers are being paid to grow wild flowers and not produce food hits the news media there will be public outrage.
Stick a note in your diary and we will revisit this a years time.

I reckon its clear they did not expect folk taking full fields/parcels or more out of production and into the higher sfi paying options , how or if they address this is the concern as quite a few on here are saying this is what they are doing/considering i.e full fields .In my chat with a defra bod yesterday when I asked how many had signed up said 10000 ish also the interest had improved since before xmas. He just gave a shrug when I said thats not a lot when there are 70000 plus bps recipients.Which is why I think they will act sooner rather than later but as we havnt taken any land out of full production im hoping to stick where I am for now .Also it could well be the bigger more interested folk who have joined up already at least thats what im finding when talking to folk other than a few older guys who see it as a way to scale back and effectively increase their pension without selling up/moving out

 

[Adeptandy]

is that a bad message for media ? i don’t think so when the previous scheme was that wealthy landowners were paid for simply owning land !

i don’t think there will be public outrage ……. quite the opposite in fact

Chatting to a boiler customer today and they were quite excited that a 1/3 of the farm was going to be winter wild bird seed and spring/summer flowers

 

[steveR]

Thank

Not many farmers do all the work on their farm
most employ people to do the work

many use contractors for some or all the work

although one farmer a few decades ago
defined a farmer as someone who could
plough a field
lamb a sheep
milk a cow

a cropper just ploughed and drilled

Thank Gawd, that list did not include "shear a sheep"!

 

[HatsOff]

I reckon its clear they did not expect folk taking full fields/parcels or more out of production and into the higher sfi paying options , how or if they address this is the concern as quite a few on here are saying this is what they are doing/considering i.e full fields .In my chat with a defra bod yesterday when I asked how many had signed up said 10000 ish also the interest had improved since before xmas. He just gave a shrug when I said thats not a lot when there are 70000 plus bps recipients.Which is why I think they will act sooner rather than later but as we havnt taken any land out of full production im hoping to stick where I am for now .Also it could well be the bigger more interested folk who have joined up already at least thats what im finding when talking to folk other than a few older guys who see it as a way to scale back and effectively increase their pension without selling up/moving out

SFI only really needs to add an option

FOOD1 - pay £233.30/ha for growing some food.

If they do that, merge with CS and make some simplifications we could be on the way to a half decent scheme.

 

[Clive]

SFI only really needs to add an option

FOOD1 - pay £233.30/ha for growing some food.

If they do that, merge with CS and make some simplifications we could be on the way to a half decent scheme.

wouldn’t be over attractive when there is a “don’t grow food at £852.00/ha” option though would it !

what’s the obsession with growing food ? was there public outcry about growing crops for energy ? ……. no ! in fact i think most probably think it a good thing

 

[Clive]

there is no shortage of ruddy food ! the stuff is so plentiful it can be bought for less or little more than its cost of production

why are farmers even remotely bothered about reducing supply ? …….. doing so may actually make it worth growing

 

[HatsOff]

wouldn’t be over attractive when there is a “don’t grow good at £852.00/ha” though would it !

what’s the obsession with growing food ? was there public outcry about growing crops for energy ? ……. no ! in fact i think most probably think it a good thing

Farming, by definition, is growing food and raising livestock. It's always been an aberration that the sustainable farming incentive didn't explicitly include support for it, seeing as that is the ultimate public good provided by farmers.

 

[lloyd]

there is no shortage of ruddy food ! the stuff is so plentiful it can be bought for less or little more than its cost of production

why are farmers even remotely bothered about reducing supply ? …….. doing so may actually make it worth growing

I think it's more the case of the inequality of the whole system.
It seems the ones who historically have caused most harm to the natural
enviroment are being rewarded the greatest.

 

[Farma Parma]

for those weathing the storm so to speak hold on in there lads we will score one of these days
dont ask me when mind, only snag is cash might run out before that day tho

 

[steveR]

My thoughts exactly. You just need to get the fixed costs down. Problem is when the 3 year agreement is up and Defra have stopped SFI and you have to start farming again with out any kit and labour on a weed infested farm. Just looking on the bright side

And the first thing you go out and buy, is a big, deep bodied plough....

I am not in SFI, but have lots of experience of bringing land back into production after 3 years of birdy mixtures. The local lads growing spuds is perfect!!

 

[Steevo]

But capping goes against the idea of reducing overheads and of joining up worthwhile tracts of land area into contiguous landscape scale schemes?
On 200 acres, the overheads for RT and all the bollox that goes with it are airesdy high per acre of crop. If I reduce cropped area by half they get even bigger per acre. If I put the whole small farm in schemes then the overhead associated with cropping disappears completely. If only put half the farm in schemes I create another significant overhead in the admin needed to run the schemes.
So I hope they think about this with any calling they might consider. Most likely same scenario applies to big farms as well. If you going to get a harvest gang set up then the more acres they cover the cheaper the set up overhead becomes, so better to either ditch arable completely or carry on 100%. I can’t see pissing about with a bit of both helping very much with efficiencies.

Wise words!!

 

[Flatland guy]

Regarding uptake IIRC DEFRA were hoping SFI to cover 70% of the agricultural area under various SFI options. Now the forms are coming in either the budget will not cope if 70% take up the scheme or if the budget is finite then either they do not hit their own target of covering a large percentage of land. Whether those behind the scenes are not happy with ultimately controlling a smaller percentage of the agricultural land than envisaged becomes a problem only time will tell.

However any blame at the SFI scheme should lay firmly at those that created it! Any land manager should not be made the scapegoat due to the relevant Government body designing a scheme without the necessary safeguards in place. If they didn't want whole fields/farms they should have had that foresight.