East Sussex farming leader slams government’s removal of nature incentive scheme as farmer confidence hits all time low

Defra announced on Tuesday evening, without warning, that it is stopping all Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) applications.

The SFI scheme rewards farmers for creating habitats and managing natural features on their land.

The National Farmers’ Union (NFU) says the sudden closure of SFI is a huge blow for thousands of farmers, and the environment.

The news comes at a time when the NFU has released the results of a new survey which reveal farmer confidence is at all-time low.

NFU East Sussex Chair Martin Hole, who farms at Pevensey, said: “This is terrible news for thousands of farmers across Sussex and the South East who were planning to be a part of this year’s SFI scheme.

“Farmers were given no warning whatsoever that applications are closing and the NFU was only informed 30 minutes before Defra announced the news to the media. This is a huge kick in the teeth to our hard-working farmers and growers.

“The government had promised to work with us to deliver a positive future for British farming but, yet again, they have failed to communicate or consult with us over a crucial farming issue.

“This is also very bad news for the environment as much of the planned positive environmental work to boost biodiversity and enhance the countryside may now not go ahead. Without that financial incentive, many farmers and growers who are already facing huge financial pressures – greatly enhanced by the government’s devastating Autumn Budget – will now need to focus purely on doing what they need to do to ensure their businesses can survive.”

SFI is part of a system of environmental payments brought in during the post-Brexit transition away from EU-era subsidies.

Defra says more than half of the country's farmed land is now managed under these schemes, with more than 37,000 live SFI agreements in place. 

However, this record participation means the maximum budget limit has been reached, so the government has stopped accepting new SFI applications for this year.

Mr Hole said: “In moving forward from this it is more important than ever to work with the Defra teams in righting this debacle.

“The stakes, our environment and our farming industry are too high to risk in departmental mismanagement.”

Meanwhile, the NFU released results of its annual Farmer Confidence Survey on Wednesday.

This found that farm business confidence has reached historically low levels, bypassing the record lows set last year, and this all before Defra’s SFI announcement.

This comes on top of an ongoing cashflow crisis and a bombshell Budget last October which announced the family farm tax, the increase in employer National Insurance Contributions, and the acceleration of the Direct Payments phaseout.

The survey also showed, for the first time ever, investment across the board is drying up with farmers and growers unable to make investments in key areas such as machinery, infrastructure and energy efficiency.

NFU President Tom Bradshaw said: “When our Confidence Survey results came out last year, we thought we’d hit rock bottom. When we were looking to release our new survey results, we knew we’d hit a new all-time low. Now, with another hammer blow dealt to the farming sector without warning, I’m realising there is no such thing as rock bottom as far as Defra is concerned.”

The news raises serious questions about the future of homegrown food production, at a time when geopolitical tensions are high, and the government has repeatedly stated the importance of food security to our national security.

In its newly-launched Blueprints for Growth, the NFU has provided solutions that, if adopted, would help reverse this collapse in farmer confidence and enable much-needed investment in the future of British food and farming.

Mr Bradshaw said: “If government wants to re-build confidence, work with us, not against us. We are ready and waiting to help set a new brighter course for the UK farming sector.”