Sustainable farming incentive - handbook for 2023 has been published

[Janet Hughes Defra]

Afternoon all,

Today we've published a handbook containing all the detailed information about the sustainable farming incentive offer for this year.

The handbook is here:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/sfi-handbook-for-the-sfi-2023-offer

An overview blogpost is here: https://defrafarming.blog.gov.uk/2023/06/21/sfi-more-ways-to-enhance-your-income-productivity-and-the-environment/

The handbook sets out all the detailed actions, rules and requirements of the scheme, in a single handbook that you can download and print (because this is what many of you have asked us to do, rather than spreading the information across multiple pages on GOV.UK).

We have made some changes to the scheme in response to feedback from you and other farmers and through our pilot and early rollout of the scheme. In particular, we have made a much broader range of options available, made the scheme more flexible so you can pick the individual actions you want to do rather than having to do them in set combinations or percentages of land entered into the scheme.

Finally, I know I have not been present on the forum in the consistent, ongoing way many of you would like. I understand why that has been frustrating and annoying, and I am really sorry about that. I have found that am just not able to personally engage on every thread on an ongoing basis, I'm afraid. However I do really want to find a way of addressing your questions and hearing your feedback all the time, not just when we publish new information, so I am working with @Clive to put in place a better, ongoing, sustainable way of managing this so that you can ask questions of me and my team and give us feedback when they arise. We will let you know where we get to with that as soon as possible.

For this particular thread, I am planning to be online at least daily, for the next week, to answer your questions about the information we've published today. I have posted this as a question with voting, and if you could upvote questions that you particularly want me to address it would be helpful if you could vote for them so that I can prioritise my time and attention, and I will then do my best to work through as many of them as I possibly can. I hope this is helpful and look forward to your questions.

If you have questions about your specific farm situation, the best thing to do is contact the RPA contact centre and they will be able to point you in the right direction.

Thank you.

 

[Janet Hughes Defra]

Hi Janet

I thought having read the guidance low input grassland could have a maximum of 12 tonnes/ha of cattle manure or equivalent spread / year or have misunderstood

page 91 of the booklet

That's correct, but the action I was referring to in answer to the question about it was IGL3, which is the grass buffer strip action - the application of fertilisers / manures is prohibited in that action

 

[DrWazzock]

I’ve been hearing the financial farming problems are at epidemic levels from a number of professional people. The general consensus is that it’s never been as bad and these folks have never known anything like it. Hence the amount of land coming onto the market. I’m not sure if this is just isolated to hill or grassland areas or further afield. These folks are hoping for some immediate change of heart and direction of travel by our command otherwise it’s going to be pretty dire. There was even talk that our suppliers squealing might help. Not good times. Some well established professional farmers complaining and packing up too.

It’s plain to see in arable. Commodity prices back nearly 40% from peak. Grown with very expensive inputs. Cost of living, utiiities etc still very high. Bank rate keeps rising. You don’t need a degree in economics to see there’s trouble ahead. And they are cutting support at a time like this. Madness really. Oh well.

 

[Janet Hughes Defra]

Please bear in mind that some of us have not even had a minute to start reading through it all!
Perhaps pop back in on a fortnightly basis for a couple of months?

Yes, happy to keep the thread open while there are still questions - I won't be around very much for the next 3 days as I'm on a residential course that runs all day and eve on Tues and Weds and then in meetings all day Thurs, but I'll come back on Friday and pick up question, and then again next week.

Personally as a small dairy farm (well below national average herd size) when dairies are looking more and more for economies of scale and reducing stocking isn't really an option, unless we sell the cows, I am struggling to see how we are going to be anywhere near able to replace our BPS income and stay in milk. We used to have a big HLS scheme and CSS prior to that, hosted visits from Lord Curry and Ben Bradshaw when he was a Minister. Our HLS payment was as big as our BPS. But payment rates not kept pace and we are still waiting for a hedge laying claim from work done in December to be paid, it is just so much more hassle than it used to be. We have fantastic hedges, some lovely wildflower meadows, acres of ridge and furrow PROPER permanent pasture, 9 field ponds on 140 acres, and were a FWAG Silver Lapwing Finalist when FWAG covered the whole country.

I'm sorry to hear about the hassle with your capital claim - if you've not been in touch with RPA to follow it up, I'd recommend you do that. More broadly we're working to reduce the hassle and bureaucracy in schemes to make them much easier to deal with - we've made some progress on this front but know that there is more to do.

We are already BVD free accredited and although we've joined it, the Health and Welfare pathway is daft. The lower payment for dairy herds is on the basis that it pays for bulk tank test - but this is not accepted as evidence of BVD free status by BVD free England , only bloods, which are more expensive.

I've passed this feedback on to my animal health and welfare colleagues - thanks

 

[Janet Hughes Defra]

Bearing in mind that most LFA farms farming beef and sheep have needed bps to show a profit and the last figures we have which were actually quoted on here earlier show an average of £16,000 loss before subsidies on these farms, are you aware of what is happening to those types of farm?
SFI only provides 30% of full bps amount on these places so making most unviable. Are you happy with this situation as it unfolds? There’s a lot of land for sale which won’t be going back into livestock production and as these are mainly family farms, it’s going to play havoc with the upland communities and infrastructure.
Also from a business planning point of view what is the intention from the government with this in mind?

We're aware of the contribution BPS makes to LFA grazing livestock farms, yes - that's why the government decided to phase out BPS over 7 years, to give farmers time to plan and adapt, and why there is a range of payments and other support being made available.

The farming budget doesn't just pay for SFI, and SFI isn't intended to be the only way to make up your BPS income - there is also CS mid-tier and higher tier, a range of one-off grants and productivity support, including animal health and welfare advice funding. There are summaries of the range of options available now for grassland and upland farmers in CS and SFI, here: https://defrafarming.blog.gov.uk/about-us/ and there will be more options coming next year, as set out in our update in January.

It's for each farm to determine the combination of measures and payments to suit your farm business. To support this, Defra is also funding business planning advice through the resilience fund, to help farmers plan their businesses as BPS payments are phased out. You can choose your provider. Details of all the payments on offer are available here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/funding-for-farmers, and details of the resilience fund are available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/get-free-business-advice-for-your-farm

 

[Janet Hughes Defra]

Bearing in mind that most LFA farms farming beef and sheep have needed bps to show a profit and the last figures we have which were actually quoted on here earlier show an average of £16,000 loss before subsidies on these farms, are you aware of what is happening to those types of farm?
SFI only provides 30% of full bps amount on these places so making most unviable. Are you happy with this situation as it unfolds? There’s a lot of land for sale which won’t be going back into livestock production and as these are mainly family farms, it’s going to play havoc with the upland communities and infrastructure.
Also from a business planning point of view what is the intention from the government with this in mind?

We're aware of the contribution BPS makes to LFA grazing livestock farms, yes - that's why the government decided to phase out BPS over 7 years, to give farmers time to plan and adapt, and why there is a range of payments and other support being made available.

The farming budget doesn't just pay for SFI, and SFI isn't intended to be the only way to make up your BPS income - there is also CS mid-tier and higher tier, a range of one-off grants and productivity support, including animal health and welfare advice funding. There are summaries of the range of options available now for grassland and upland farmers in CS and SFI, here: https://defrafarming.blog.gov.uk/about-us/ and there will be more options coming next year, as set out in our update in January.

It's for each farm to determine the combination of measures and payments to suit your farm business. To support this, Defra is also funding business planning advice through the resilience fund, to help farmers plan their businesses as BPS payments are phased out. You can choose your provider. Details of all the payments on offer are available here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/funding-for-farmers, and details of the resilience fund are available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/get-free-business-advice-for-your-farm

 

[Janet Hughes Defra]

Well it wasn’t a total lack of response….it’s just that you didn’t answer my question!
You will be acquiring this national hedgerow database….and the information could be used against us in the future.DEFRA are now ‘consulting’ whether the 2m margin alongside hedgerows should become compulsory after 20 years of being optional . I don’t trust them to come to any fair conclusions.

Sorry, I thought I had addressed the question - to clarify: the hedgerow buffer margin requirement is part of cross-compliance, so it's not optional for anyone claiming BPS - the consultation is about what the rules should be and how they should work when cross-compliance ends.
We're not looking to use information against you in that way, we're looking to be helpful and pragmatic. But I do understand the concern, and appreciate that you will need to see and believe this approach being delivered in a consistent, comprehensive way in order to believe it.

 

[Janet Hughes Defra]

@Janet Hughes Defra

I'm not asking what the actions should be, I'm asking what the aim is. If the aim is not clear and easily understood by all involved, then how exactly can a claimant develop a method of achieving it? Why are you blankly refusing to detail what is required to meet the standard?

This vagueness has to be a fundamental Defra policy decision, I am sure that you and those under you are not so foolish to not be able to understand this point. Such vagueness as to the basic aims of any given standard can only give Defra a huge amount of power - as you have detailed they will be judge, jury and executioner once decisions start being made on farmers actions. An 'appeals' process that is in the hands of the very people who made the first decision can never be anything other than a whitewashing process.

And to then claim that applicants can always appeal to the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman is frankly insulting, given the recent revelations that they have a backlog of thousands of cases and are currently refusing to accept new cases unless they meet a threshold of being severe cases of maladministration. When they are faced with thousands of claims of incompetence within the NHS that may have resulted in severe injury, disability or death, I hardly think they are going to give a farmer who thinks his SFI payments have been wrongfully withheld much of a hearing.

https://committees.parliament.uk/work/1503/parliamentary-and-health-service-ombudsman-scrutiny-202021/news/170930/mps-concerned-at-substantial-backlog-at-nhs-and-government-complaints-body/

We're not trying to give ourselves power, we're trying to give you flexibility so that you can implement the actions in whatever way makes most sense on your farm, and put in place more flexible and pragmatic controls to support that. This is our response to farmers asking us to make schemes less prescriptive and inflexible, so that they can actually work for you in practice.

 

[livestock 1]

It’s plain to see in arable. Commodity prices back nearly 40% from peak. Grown with very expensive inputs. Cost of living, utiiities etc still very high. Bank rate keeps rising. You don’t need a degree in economics to see there’s trouble ahead. And they are cutting support at a time like this. Madness really. Oh well.

I’ve been quoting this problem looming for some time probably 15/18 months now. Not sure everyone had done their sums. The big cost increase of inputs then the time lag it took for our product to lift was around 9/10 months then it’s on the downward slide again now. The governments interference with trying to cap prices retailers charge has further exasperated the situation. They should surely realise that the retailers won’t cut their margin so just add pressure downwards at this end, the outcome won’t help the consumer whatever it is.

 

[Goweresque]

We're not trying to give ourselves power, we're trying to give you flexibility so that you can implement the actions in whatever way makes most sense on your farm, and put in place more flexible and pragmatic controls to support that. This is our response to farmers asking us to make schemes less prescriptive and inflexible, so that they can actually work for you in practice.

I give up. I specifically asked about the AIMS being vague, not the actions, and you've blanked my question for the second time. Its obvious this 'engagement' process is a sham. You have made your minds up, and you have no intention of taking anything else on board.

 

[Janet Hughes Defra]

@Janet Hughes Defra . Hi janet appreciate you answering questions I would have replied earlier but i’ve spent the last week trying to read all 150 pages and update and advise a number people that there sfi application is now gone and we need to go over it all again before their combine starts rolling in the next week or so. would have been much more sensible to release the new SFI april even May giving people the time to make the informed decisions.I also ask you to consider bringing in payments for soil health.

Can you clarify if you will update the capital grant eligibility to protect or manage an SFI option. It only states cs options or SFI pilot. In Mid tier you can fence to manage gs4 GS2 and hedges, these are now in sfi so would make sense to be able to fence.

Yes, those in SFI will have access to the CS capital offer (see section 1.1, page 7)

Can i also ask why CSF has increased its paperwork not reduced it. and why regional approaches to and consideration to eligibility are different.

Can I ask you to say a bit more about how has CSF increased paperwork and what the issues are in terms of regional variations? (There aren't any regional variations in SFI eligibility)

I feel we are still stuck in the approach of CS mid tier, GS2 delivers too many objectives and thus makes it convoluted and restrictive hence why many people didn’t like CS, it’s trying to deliver reduced nutrients, protect nesting birds, protect soil cover etc, which are now in LIG1. you could actually have stacked that option. Buffer strips also provide rough habitat around features and would reduce run off from manures so in principle why not allow buffer strips to be compatible, it is after all supposed to be a new scheme? Not rehashed CS? I appreciate some options you have opened up the prescriptions but not the deliverables.

We've also amended the rules of options to make them more flexible and address issues that we often hear about from farmers in the way the options work. You can put buffer strips around LIG1 in SFI, through action IGL1 - see page 90 of the handbook which sets this out.

Again same approach. you can actually have legumes in existence before applying, and you don’t have to plough out a field to do this you can overseed or slot seed to get establishment without doing major disturbance. (I do hope if the reduced tillage option comes out grass will be eligible)

Again same approach to CS, i thought it was a new scheme new rules new thought process, or are we still running income forgone. i thought we were supposed to be paying for and rewarding environmental improvements, even driving behavioural change?

I'm not quite following your concern here (sorry) - the legumes option allows you to maintain existing legumes or establish new ones if they're not there already, and you can overseed or slot seed if you wish - it's up to you how you establish the legumes so long as you meet the aim of the action. Do you disagree with those rules? If so please can I ask why is that?

I agree with grass and grain by rpa rules a field is defined by permanent boundary, but many large fields are split cropped. Therefore no insecticide needs to be part parcel.

Thanks, yes I've noted that feedback and am discussing it with my colleagues.

I also think its implementation is against the principle of IPM. A true IPM approach would be pest and diesease pressure against beneficials whilst considering options to enhance beneficials. if pest pressure is too high and beneficials too low that is when insecticide would be considered. £45/ha doesn’t compensate yield loss to severe bydv. we should be able to be very ambitious with this option but can’t as you can only decrease by 50%.if you could just declare each year if you’ve managed to avoid insecticides and how many ha rather than commit fixed ha that would get more consideration and uptake as it reduces risk.

I do see your point, and we considered that approach, but we opted for asking you to make a commitment for the duration of your agreement but giving a degree of flexibility so you can vary it each year and providing a way for you to let us know if it turns out you're not able to meet the commitment in any given year for some reason.

That's because we think on balance that we need to see a multi-year commitment to this action wherever possible in order to contribute to the intended outcomes and justify the investment, but we also think it's right to allow some flexibility to vary the area each year and respond in a fair and pragmatic way when there are issues that mean you can't fulfil the action.

 

[Goweresque]

And if you sign up for SFI the local mental health crisis support team?

Not necessarily. As I detailed above, I reckon its quite possible for me to make more money by doing nothing. The question is whether that is morally acceptable to me. It would require me to in effect enact a sort of Highland clearances, get rid of all the people who currently use my land for food production (and other activities like shoots) and just close the gates on the whole thing for 3 years, and pick up a fat cheque for doing so.

 

[The Seeker]

It’s not to me so again I’m 35k short and still wondering what people will eat in the future , if you want to help the world stop using so much oil. This global attack on farmers is wearing bloody thin

 

[Huno]

We're aware of the contribution BPS makes to LFA grazing livestock farms, yes - that's why the government decided to phase out BPS over 7 years, to give farmers time to plan and adapt, and why there is a range of payments and other support being made available.

The farming budget doesn't just pay for SFI, and SFI isn't intended to be the only way to make up your BPS income - there is also CS mid-tier and higher tier, a range of one-off grants and productivity support, including animal health and welfare advice funding. There are summaries of the range of options available now for grassland and upland farmers in CS and SFI, here: https://defrafarming.blog.gov.uk/about-us/ and there will be more options coming next year, as set out in our update in January.

It's for each farm to determine the combination of measures and payments to suit your farm business. To support this, Defra is also funding business planning advice through the resilience fund, to help farmers plan their businesses as BPS payments are phased out. You can choose your provider. Details of all the payments on offer are available here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/funding-for-farmers, and details of the resilience fund are available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/get-free-business-advice-for-your-farm

You have been saying all of this since day one but tenant farmers (6000) at the last count are struggling and seeking help from people like FCN... broadcasts like this help no one... keep broadcasting.. we are stopping listening now...

 

[Huno]

Is this a Chinese state sponsored binary forum? I can't believe a human has answered 58 pages of questions and honest outpourings thus far?

 

[The Seeker]

This can only push good prices up and Control of food onto fewer and fewer hands whilst a mass skill loss exits the industry. When you struggle to make food due to cost of production prices and make a decent profit to grow from something is sadly wrong and defra have it sadly wrong. Yes I know you defra are going to ride the pony all the way but sadly it’s not right at all.

 

[Huno]

blah blah

This can only push good prices up and Control of food onto fewer and fewer hands whilst a mass skill loss exits the industry. When you struggle to make food due to cost of production prices and make a decent profit to grow from something is sadly wrong and defra have it sadly wrong. Yes I know you defra are going to ride the pony all the way but sadly it’s not right at all.

blah...blah..blah.. fair comment pal

 

[The Seeker]

Arable farmers will fair better that marginal livestock who will struggle to keep farming as it’s hard to work from under a bus. Mate I appreciate you might be in a different position but to me and my neighbours this is serious money

 

[Huno]

Arable farmers will fair better that marginal livestock who will struggle to keep farming as it’s hard to work from under a bus. Mate I appreciate you might be in a different position but to me and my neighbours this is serious money

no mate.. all of us will suffer proportionately and i mean proportionately... I have the greatest respect for those at the geographical height limits of the UK... and know that ground well.. they suffer first but we will all suffer.. farmers that is not scumy landowners..

 

[livestock 1]

We're aware of the contribution BPS makes to LFA grazing livestock farms, yes - that's why the government decided to phase out BPS over 7 years, to give farmers time to plan and adapt, and why there is a range of payments and other support being made available.

The farming budget doesn't just pay for SFI, and SFI isn't intended to be the only way to make up your BPS income - there is also CS mid-tier and higher tier, a range of one-off grants and productivity support, including animal health and welfare advice funding. There are summaries of the range of options available now for grassland and upland farmers in CS and SFI, here: https://defrafarming.blog.gov.uk/about-us/ and there will be more options coming next year, as set out in our update in January.

It's for each farm to determine the combination of measures and payments to suit your farm business. To support this, Defra is also funding business planning advice through the resilience fund, to help farmers plan their businesses as BPS payments are phased out. You can choose your provider. Details of all the payments on offer are available here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/funding-for-farmers, and details of the resilience fund are available here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/get-free-business-advice-for-your

Thanks for your reply.

On a personal level we have made changes to the business which started before the bps reductions came into effect. They were and still are predominantly land improvement and livestock improved genetics. These do return more income and profit in time but are costly in the short to medium term for the business.
We have had huge input costs never experienced before which has thrown a spanner in the works for all farmers. No one can plan for 300% increase in fertiliser, 100% increase in fuel, 30% increase in feed and so on. Similar comments can be made about energy and almost everything else incoming to the business. It’s also worth noting that farmers have been cutting costs for some time before this and eventually there’s no costs left to be cut that won’t end up having a more negative effect on the business than they save.
The money replacing bps with capital grants is helpful but doesn’t replace a direct payment it’s still in reality spending money. Most 40% grants still leave us with the majority of the outlay to find and in unfavourable trading conditions that the government has us in it’s doubtful that these expenses are wise.
As I stated earlier most lfa farms weren’t making a profit before the full bps payment and most profit on their accounts was less than the full bps amount.
From this we can conclude where this leaves us.

 

[andybk]

@Janet Hughes Defra
hi janet , im just in a new low input grass land c/s as of january , can i still apply for the soil testing grant ?, thanks