SFI Pilot payments

[Jackov Altraids]

Contrary to the first paragraph the grassland standards as set out in the pilot would directly affect my profitability.
How? Because I would have to spend time and money on soil sampling which I only carry out when I consider the ground might need lime so limited to simple pH testing anything behind is an additional cost.
The cattle are outwintered whenever possible so the muck and urine is applied where it falls.and I won’t be importing any organic material.
I don’t apply fertiliser.
I reseed where the cattle have been over winter and they do most of the work in turning over the ground. I rotate those areas but outwintering would appear to fall foul of the bare ground rules despite there being no runoff or soil erosion. To avoid bare ground I would need to house cattle with the additional costs of bedding and spreading manure and the cost of the buildings themselves.
I strip graze and back fence spring calving sucklers which provides maximum opportunities for grass production but I don’t see that fits in with minimum award heights nor can it when the purpose is to graze the grass off and move on daily. I conserve any surplus as it arises.
Waiting to cut for winter forage until a centrally determined date makes to sense in terms of grass quality, growth and the weather.
Delivering on the number of grass species per square metre is an interesting one to monitor and enforce when the grazing system means they don’t get time to go to seed and if the inspector turns up in January how will that part of the requirement be determined?
My system means I have minimal metal wear and I burn as little diesel as possible.
My profitability depends on selling maximum kilos of 12 month old suckled calves off the farm. To comply with the SFI rules as I read them would mean I would have to reduce the numbers cows on the farm and my output while my fixed costs remain the same and therefore my profitability fails significantly.
.
@Janet Hughes Defra I would be grateful if you would run the detail of my simple system past your ‘experts’ and ask them how I can possibly deliver the requirements of the SFI pilot and also the SFI scheme beyond the pilot since I may have missed something.
While I don’t expect an immediate response I would appreciate confirmation that you have asked the question and will provide the experts solutions in due course or perhaps an acknowledgement that SFI doesn’t work at the current levels of compensation for all grass farms.

This is a perfect example of why I find ELMS sickening.
You sound very much like you are farming in a sustainable way.
SFI should be all about supporting this whereas it currently seems to do the opposite.

I was listening to a 'rewilder' exhibiting at the Chelsea flower show this morning.
He said that food production would not be affected because only unproductive land would be rewilded.

This is wrong on 2 levels.
Firstly, there are no controls on what land is rewilded, and it would seem that a lot of productive land is being made unproductive.
Secondly, it completely misses the point that this 'unproductive' land is very often rich habitat being maintained by its use of grazing. To rewild it could well see a decline in biodiversity.

I think 'rewilding' has the potential to do good things, but the locations for success are very limited.

 

[Goweresque]

I was listening to a 'rewilder' exhibiting at the Chelsea flower show this morning.
He said that food production would not be affected because only unproductive land would be rewilded.

That makes no sense, even if true (and as you say, chances are much productive land will be re-wilded). Unproductive land (presumably in the sense that it is marginally profitable) still produces food. So removing marginally profitable land from production will still impact overall food production levels, it has to.

 

[delilah]

ELMS is supposedly about public good. Ask the public what they find good; waist high ragwort and thistles, or a decent field of grass where they can have a picnic/ pitch their tent/ al fresco shag. PP delivers more public good than rewilding, it's not even a contest.

 

[Azlett]

Looking through all the negative comments here, it is difficult to separate those from people who have no desire to modify their farming systems and are looking for SFI to replace the BPS cash from those who are interpreting the sustainability intentions of SFI and looking how to adapt their farming system appropriately (if necessary) and are still finding the proposals impossible. It seems reasonable to me to work on the basis that increased sustainability requires lower intensity, which may lead to lower inputs, lower outputs and increased profit.

However, the payment rates are not enough to cover the risk associated with the move, even for farms who in time could adopt various SFI standards and elements of LNR as well. A 100% PP farm, entirely in SFI low input grassland standard, operating on 24 hour mob-grazing with long rest rotations, is doing pretty much the most for sustainability, is not able to add more land into LNR, and gets about 50% of the BPS. That is not an attractive proposition to encourage more to try the standard, even if the profitability of the move might increase.

The comment above about abattoirs though is crucial. The whole sustainability thing hinges on livestock and DEFRA need to see this as a whole process and in order for this to work, they can't just focus on the farming end of livestock. Equal emphasis and support is needed for abattoirs, butchers and environmental ethics etc for the consumption of meat. @Janet Hughes Defra , please advise Govt accordingly

 

[ajd132]

ELMS is supposedly about public good. Ask the public what they find good; waist high ragwort and thistles, or a decent field of grass where they can have a picnic/ pitch their tent/ al fresco shag. PP delivers more public good than rewilding, it's not even a contest.

No till carbon sequestering food crops provide far more public good than some grass

 

[holwellcourtfarm]

No till carbon sequestering food crops provide far more public good than some grass

Agreed. Some grass is a green desert for biodiversity.

Suitably managed grassland often provides significantly more biodiversity value than virtually all arable land though, whilst still producing food. None of this is simple.

The worst grassland and arable operations for genuine biodiversity delivery are often the highly intensive ones (ignoring any land they may set aside to offset their impact, typically around 5% of their farmed area). The extensive ones often produce less output per hectare but alongside much more biodiversity and not necessarily at higher cost per unit output.

Those calling for significant farm intensification in order to spare land for nature are missing this important point, sometimes intentionally.

 

[delilah]

No till carbon sequestering food crops provide far more public good than some grass

A cultivated market garden provides far more public good than a no till wheat field. Which is neither here nor there; I was comparing PP to rewilding.

 

[Dave645]

Looking through all the negative comments here, it is difficult to separate those from people who have no desire to modify their farming systems and are looking for SFI to replace the BPS cash from those who are interpreting the sustainability intentions of SFI and looking how to adapt their farming system appropriately (if necessary) and are still finding the proposals impossible. It seems reasonable to me to work on the basis that increased sustainability requires lower intensity, which may lead to lower inputs, lower outputs and increased profit.

However, the payment rates are not enough to cover the risk associated with the move, even for farms who in time could adopt various SFI standards and elements of LNR as well. A 100% PP farm, entirely in SFI low input grassland standard, operating on 24 hour mob-grazing with long rest rotations, is doing pretty much the most for sustainability, is not able to add more land into LNR, and gets about 50% of the BPS. That is not an attractive proposition to encourage more to try the standard, even if the profitability of the move might increase.

The comment above about abattoirs though is crucial. The whole sustainability thing hinges on livestock and DEFRA need to see this as a whole process and in order for this to work, they can't just focus on the farming end of livestock. Equal emphasis and support is needed for abattoirs, butchers and environmental ethics etc for the consumption of meat. @Janet Hughes Defra , please advise Govt accordingly

@Janet Hughes Defra
I think the point they missed, is a lot of farm incomes were already poor, so trying to introduce new systems that will even temporarily lower profits increase the number of rules that they have to follow and just increase general complexity of farming practices from record keeping to new rules and targets, is over taxing.

even if the new system was only going to effect us in only one of those ways, we would be upset, but they seem to be going for the full monty.
They are cutting 100% of BPS they are replacing it with schemes that require large amounts of oversight either with us recording with soil samples, and photo’s etc, then we have implementation and the weather with seemingly overly complex rules one commenter noted plant diversity per m2 in their grass options, the mind just boggles where even that simple sounding rule, to the fool that made that up, would end. that’s the problem targets are fine and perfect is fine but only on paper, nature and the weather never let perfect ever exist out side of the planning stage.

the complexity and rules need Shredding and returning to a single page just like these scheme and Red tractors rule books.

monitoring is fine to asses results but the results are the results, if a farmer buys and applies the correct seed mix then the results are the results. If the desired result failed then it failed if the option requires reseeding every 3-5 years the results will stand for the next 3-5 years.
Cover crops, I don’t disagree they can be positive in arable cropping, and experiments with under sown clover sound good if the right variety is found ideally hardy (roundup resistant) and robust husbandry systems have been established, that sounds like a win.
But rules that force set inflexible rules and target dates and set amounts of land to be taken out of production , target levels of cover etc are all just pointless and stupid to even aim for, like others have said a lot of small farmers are one man bands, mine is, any number of factors can effect what gets done when, my health, weather, machinery, machinery break downs, my contract spray man and how busy he is, availability of seed, the land being in the correct condition to be worked, even if it’s sunny it doesn’t mean that the land can be seeded or worked.
I have red clay land at a guess it’s perfect to work about 7 days a year the rest it’s either too dry or too wet.
Yet you want targets dates and cover targets.
What I want is as much winter cropping as possible to get done, and any sidelining of that goal may result in the main target being missed, my farm making a profit.

the very fact that originally 66% of the farmings money was put into schemes that, have zero to do with food production, safe guarding farm incomes, and unless large groups of small farmers could agree were going to be outside of their reach, made the whole reboot a joke, made up by people that don’t get the stakes and pressures farming is under, then to have the remaining 33% have so many stupide targets and rules put on them even if they claim policing will be mild, that seems pointless if rules are made at some point they are expected to be followed so the fact these rules and targets exist at all is a red flag,
What They should have been at most was, good practice targets, reduce bare land to a minimum but no worries if it’s not possible.
Non of the targets of that first 33% ( the entry level scheme) should have effected basic farm profitability at all.
Cross compliance type rules,
So maybe the ones we have now, then a target to have, no bare land if avoidable.
Land for spring drilling having to be not sprayed off completely if it is, a cover crop established if possible.
Any cover crop of any type.
From natural regeneration from cultivation, if it’s naturally greening up again, to putting some seed on to establish a cover, even if it’s some seed off the heap. Cultivate it to bring up new seeds to germinate. If a basic green cover seems to be growing job done.

the next worry when we see rules and set dates is even if at the moment DEFRA is flexible, what happens when we change government and a new set of bosses set new targets, they can turn around and set them in stone and we already have agreements in place. . . We move from, they are more guidelines, to they are the rules, over night.

what happens if wheat jumps up in value and we are tied to agreements, the core of our income is going to have to come from farming crops these scheme offer very little, so if my hands are tied in an agreement with DEFRA for more long term goals yet the core profitability of my farms is at risk or under performing do I get, an out?
Farming incomes have always had cycles, trying to avoid the downs, and catch the ups, has always been important and this is doubly true when BPS goes. Farming needs the flexibility to respond, we are still businesses.

farming inputs are jumping up as they always have and yet incomes are slow to follow.
The average price of machinery has jumped massively. The worry is that if farm incomes drop that investment will also have to drop, I can say this investment is not always in new equipment, for small farms equipment is often second hand, this helps keep equipment costs at levels that leave profits to live on, having schemes dropping only new equipment is just bad use of money, where perfectly usable second hand equipment could be purchased and help with cash follow of small farms.

if DEFRA want us to have direct drills, then what difference is it if that’s a second hand one or new?
Same for other equipment. A 40% grant is a 40% grant if it’s on a new £30k drill or a £12k second hand one. It also makes the money go further and also reduces the farms needed investment finding 60% of £12k ish on a small farms, is easier, than finding the same % to get the new drill.
We all like new kit, but a lot of small farms can manage with older, smaller kit this is a natural fit, second hand equipment filters down to smaller farms, as it always has done.

 

[Ceri]

Tell you what folks the promises made by Eustice, Johnson etc etc etc etc in the lead up to the referendum about how farming was going to be once we took back control and unshackled ourselves from Eu red tape etc to the reality of whats going to happen well what can I say……………….. they’ve pretty much done the opposite of EVERYTHING they said.

We’ve completely had our pants pulled down do they have no shame and so many farming business are going to go to the wall because of it.

What a total disaster.

 

[ajcc]

I can absolutely assure you that we are definitely listening. (That doesn't mean we can agree with or act on absolutely everything everyone says though, so we're not going to satisfy everyone all of the time unfortunately, much as we might like to.)

On showing we're listening - here is an example from today: There were some comments on here and through our pilot about the fairness and balance of our contracts within our schemes.

We've published the terms and conditions for SFI today (along with the optional 'how to' technical guides). The terms and conditions include some significant changes based on feedback. For example it no longer has a clause in which Defra can change the rules or requirements, following feedback on here and in the pilot - we can now, for anyone coming into SFI, only make changes with the farmer's consent or in a genuinely exceptional situation (which is specifically defined, so that it's not in any doubt): https://www.gov.uk/government/publi...-incentive-full-guidance#terms-and-conditions

It's just one example, I realise, and I'm not saying that responds to all the feedback and input we've ever had - I just thought I'd share it as it came out today as an example of how we are listening to and acting on feedback and co-design.

We've also done quite a few things in the design of SFI in response to co-design and feedback, including:
* making the standards more flexible
* making the application process much quicker and more straightforward
* making it possible for tenants to have SFI agreements even if they are on 1-year rolling contracts
* taking a much fairer, more proportionate approach to controls (eg we won't withhold payments just on suspicion of a breach, as we did in the past in other schemes)

We have set up practitioner groups to co-design the next sets of standards for SFI and options for LNR, along with the learning from the piloting, tests and trials you and others are doing, so we can make sure they work for farmers.

We're currently testing a number of things through the pilot that are directly informing design of the scheme, including how different standards work including how they work together, how we manage visits and controls, how we manage flexibility (allowing people to change their agreements each year), and how we can best offer useful advice and guidance.

I'm not claiming we have this all perfect, and there is always plenty of room for improvement - I'm all ears as to any feedback and improvements you'd all like to see in how we engage and what we're doing. But we are absolutely committed to listening, working together and making sure what we're doing will work for farmers, and I think we can clearly show that we are doing that, albeit not perfectly and not in a way that pleases everyone all of the time.

You and your team are deluded....I just followed your link to sect.20 about agreement conditions do please tell us about “SFI HEFER”” and the observation that anyone fool enough to sign up has just put their livelihood and farm management in the hands of the county council. Ref.20. 2.3(b)(1)
Now we all familiar with Historic England and scheduling and protection of listed monuments and designation and also SSSI protection but do please BE AWARE that to give any statutory legal protection via HEFER without Historic England endorsement/protection is a new and very alarming proposal.
Natural England knows best!

 

[Goweresque]

You and your team are deluded....I just followed your link to sect.20 about agreement conditions do please tell us about “SFI HEFER”” and the observation that anyone fool enough to sign up has just put their livelihood and farm management in the hands of the county council. Ref.20. 2.3(b)(1)
Now we all familiar with Historic England and scheduling and protection of listed monuments and designation and also SSSI protection but do please BE AWARE that to give any statutory legal protection via HEFER without Historic England endorsement/protection is a new and very alarming proposal.
Natural England knows best!

Yes I noticed that little bit in there about 'historic landscapes' having to be registered if you join SFI. As ever the devil is in the detail.

 

[Ceri]

Segment on the bbc news tonight about the rise in food prices....... They haven't seen nothing yet....! Has anyone told them the governments future plans for agricultural policy - taking thousands & thousands acres of land out of food production.........? By heck Elms is going to make alot of people hungry & poor...... Good old George the saviour.

 

[serf]

Segment on the bbc news tonight about the rise in food prices....... They haven't seen nothing yet....! Has anyone told them the governments future plans for agricultural policy - taking thousands & thousands acres of land out of food production.........? By heck Elms is going to make alot of people hungry & poor...... Good old George the saviour.

Oh well they know best ......

Might be just the tonic needed for a gov to to take the job seriously rather than always giving the MAFF job to the lowest slowest MP at the bottom of the 'food chain'

 

[Ceri]

Oh well they know best ......

Might be just the tonic needed for a gov to to take the job seriously rather than always giving the MAFF job to the lowest slowest MP at the bottom of the 'food chain'

Unfortunately I think your right.

 

[Dave645]

It’s interesting maths, my BPS equates to a return on capital investment of under 0.4% per year. The amount is under the nation average annual wage which it will be for anyone on small farms, the national average wage is over £30k gross.
For that DEFRA had every farmer in the uk, in cross compliance and happy for the most part, it had not increased with inflation for a good number of years unlike wages in general if anything it had reduced over the years with modulation.
Now BPS was broken, because in my opinion no one farm should have got, more than a national average wage from BPS, it would have stopped a lot of distortion BPS caused, on my small farm I strive to double my payment just bacause I need to, to make a living and invest at least a bit, and that’s on my small farm with no economies of scale etc etc.
So like a benefits cap a max any farm can get seems sensible.
It also looks to me, to have rolled BPS payment levels over into the new scheme for farms under 100 ha and set rules like an expansion of cross compliance would have had 100% of small farms just rolling into the new scheme.
As long as the new cross compliance rules were not stupid. Had flexibility in them for real farming problems like weather and establishment issues etc.
That would have seen about 90% of farms in the scheme on an as is money level for full BPS but only about 30% of the budget DEFRA can check the maths.
That lets the big farms and land holders also getting money on the first 100ha as normal, but not on the rest, they would have look at the other scheme options and basic profitability, just as is planned now, my suggestion doesn’t make things worse for big farms any more than the current suggestions for schemes now.
It’s just that small farms are more protected from changes in finances. While entering the new schemes.
I think most small farms would agree to a lot, to hold on to what accounts for upto 100% of annual profits, as long as the new cross compliance rules are fair and don’t remove to much income.

 

[DaveGrohl]

That’s an interesting reply and I get it, but while BPS supported farmers when food production was unprofitable, for any number of reasons, poor weather only a few years ago bad weather near harvest crashed crop production, and long years, of long term over production of crops, that sustained food at rock bottom prices, we had BPS to keep farms afloat, and keep voluntary environmental options open and funded.
I don’t see a long term plan that make sense anywhere, BPS was a long term plan to sustain farming in the ups and downs, and I think it did it for a bargain price when you look at farms in the 10-100ha is size bracket and the money they got. For what they did.

I think the basic worry for farmers is the type of support BPS delivered is going, at no point will these new scheme supply an excess of money, like the BPS did, so one bad year in core profitability for crops can break us, and yet the government seems to care not. Not excess to fund voluntary environmental items.

It matters not if I have my farm in your entry level scheme if the basic profitability of the farm goes, for even one year, then that’s it end of the road, because that entry level scheme will barely make what it cost to implement and manage, even if the scheme is flexible, if I put expensive seed on to establish bird food cover crops and they fail in year one your going to want them redone over and over until they are established, even if that cost is far over the income it will bring in. It’s not wrong to want what your paying for, but at some point the farmers costs have to be taken into account. And unless things change alot no basic level or intermediate level scheme is going to bring in any meaningful profit. And high level scheme options seem so far, unrealistic to merge with weather dependant farming

I looked at the out going schemes this year and at the options, the only reason to go into it is if cropping is not profitable, I get it, but what happens if no land is profitable, for any number of reason that have happened in the past?
Your whole scheme as you say is based on working alongside profitable farming, what happens if farming is not profitable.
BPS protected profitability these new schemes don’t.

No amount of grass margins cover crop money hedgerow money, is going to keep the core farm profitable if cropping is not.
Arable farms rely on livestock farms and world market prices, live stock farms rely on markets and supermarkets to stay profitable, we only have to look at pigs eggs and chickens, over the last year, to show what happens when you let the market pay a fair price when the supermarkets are the only buyers. If we see the planned cut in meat consumption world wide then even arable farms are on shaky ground, one farm near me has taken a £500k nitrogen bill so they already gambled on next season, if the war ended and wheat dropped where does that leave them?

Just one bad year and the whole uk farming industry house of cards comes down, with it so does our society as a whole.

I look at the numbers in DEFRAS own numbers on farming incomes and what % is made up from BPS money and, it’s quite scary that they think removing this money can be done.

my gut says that, food prices will double, or farmers on a lot of small farms will go bust.
Neither is a great result.
The reality is farmers don’t get a fair market share of the income from the food they produce and nothing DEFRA is doing will fix that. And nothing in the new scheme is designed to protect the core profitability of farming it’s just wishful thinking.
I do get environmental goals are very important, but I also believe that can only be delivered by a strong profitable farming industry.

I don’t think you can polish these new schemes to the point we cannot see the broken idea behind them.
If a small farm relied on BPS for 50% of there profit year to year on average, no amount of polish will make up for that drop in income, it’s like we are a tree, our branches protect the planet and it’s people, yet DEFRA want to peal off the bark that protects us from pests and problems.
Removing BPS will have far more negative environmental results, than positive, and reduce the core resilience the farming industry had, Scotland and wales can see that.
while I am sure you have zero to do with policy, and even if you agreed even if only in part you can change nothing, we hope your pointing out what farmers think of the the car crash the new system is going to be, to the politicians.

It would be a shame if you did not, even the little boy knew to put his finger in the leak in the dam, even if he ultimately couldn’t stop the flood.

I as always will try to keep an open mind and look at the new updates to the new schemes, but so far they miss by a mile.
A question
What does the maths say if you Total up the area of land that would be in your scheme if you had the first 100 ha of land every uk farmer claims on and how much money that would cost, if payout was at BPS rates?
then adjust the cross compliance rules so the land in that first 100ha of every farm has to hit your goals that you expect to get for that amount of money. What does that look like?
As far as budget, cost to deliver, and target goals, your after?

be honest is that harder to deliver than the current schemes your planning?
Especially if you used points like the old ELS scheme used to work out if the farm was hitting targets.

Sorry that got long fast.

…… and …….. breathe………

 

[Huno]

Check out this analysis! Anyone else excited by SFI in 2022? CS double funding vs SFI doesn't look too bad now for a paltry £13 per Ha margin on a 200ha arable farm and even worse for those with grass be it perminent or not! Good old John Nix!!

 

[No wot]

Tell you what folks the promises made by Eustice, Johnson etc etc etc etc in the lead up to the referendum about how farming was going to be once we took back control and unshackled ourselves from Eu red tape etc to the reality of whats going to happen well what can I say……………….. they’ve pretty much done the opposite of EVERYTHING they said.

We’ve completely had our pants pulled down do they have no shame and so many farming business are going to go to the wall because of it.

What a total disaster.

No ones had their pants pulled down , to many farmers decided to believe a few politicians , rather than figure out the bleeding obvious , see what they did to steel workers, ship builders, miners all heavily subsidised industries , farming my well be next ,

 

[Huno]

No ones had their pants pulled down , to many farmers decided to believe a few politicians , rather than figure out the bleeding obvious , see what they did to steel workers, ship builders, miners all heavily subsidised industries , farming my well be next ,

And the turkeys did indeed vote for christmas... they reap what they sow...

 

[Huno]

At least we are re entering the boom years on prices just like in the 1970's when the lights went out but farmers bought new defender 90's