A few days ago, four of the UK’s largest wildlife NGOs launched a joint vision for the future of farming and farm payments (because Brexit means Brexit, you know).
I find the fact that WWF is paying attention to the UK countryside, and that they have joined RSPB, National Trust and the Wildlife Trusts to make a joint statement, more interesting than what they said.
We certainly need powerful alliances of this sort if wildlife is to get much of a look in in the chaos that will surround Brexit. There’s £3bn a year to play for and there is no reason at all why it should be spent in the same inefficient way that it has been in the last decades.
Some of that £3bn is yours – what would you like it to deliver?
Your NGOs want each government in the UK (for farming is a devolved matter) to;
- have a policy
- maintain payments in the interim to provide certainty
- set up a commission to think about it
- have a 25-year plan
And the principles that should underpin this are that:
- we all have a say
- there should be lots of nature
- public money should be for public goods (and the market should help)
- there should be a legislative baseline to protect wildlife and grants and advice to make things better
- everything should be joined up
Hmm. All very sensible but very opaque to most of the four organisations’ 6 million members I would guess.
I wonder where this will lead. I am encouraged by the sight of these four organisations working together but they haven’t yet set my pulse racing. I was more impressed by Greenpeace’s intervention naming and, well just naming really, a bunch of organisations and individuals who are coining it in from the current set-up. That’s the way to get the public interested in their money and how it is spent.
This debate has to get down to how the money is spent fairly quickly, and I’m still quite keen on my own suggestion for how to spend the current £3bn each year that goes to farmers:
- Send £1bn back to The Treasury to spend on wars, schools, hospitals, transport and tax cuts.
- Limit direct payments to farmers to £1bn – less than half of the total Basic Payment Scheme today. Greenpeace have some good ideas on who shouldn’t get it! Why should your and my money go as almost unconditional income support to people who are stinking rich? It’s not that I want that money, it’s just that my sense of social justice is outraged by where it does go. I’d like more money to go to poor farmers, and less to go to rich farmers. Beyond that, there’s quite a lot of thinking to be done on how that can be achieved without people finding a way to cheat in future.
- The last £1bn should be spent better and spent on those public goods such as Hen Harriers, carbon storage, clean water and flood alleviation that we have got to know and love in our discussions over the ills of driven grouse shooting. Seriously, I would like to see a transfer of money from the lowlands to the uplands to achieve a better long term future for National Parks and the communities that live in these places. Bye, bye driven grouse shooting. We need better schemes that are simple to operate and effective in delivery – more easily said than done. This is the area that wildlife NGOs should put most thought into. I’d love to see these four organisations publishing joint detailed proposals for how to deliver public goods in six months – my birthday at the end of March would be a good date. If it takes any longer then the world will have moved on – so Christmas would be much better. This is the areas where these four NGOs have most to offer – thinking caps on!
I don’t agree with the idea of a transfer of money from the lowlands to the uplands. There’s a lot of nature in the lowlands, too, it’s more patchy and so more expensive to maintain. It’s where the people who are paying your £1m (or whatever) live, too. Nature on their doorstep is important.
In pure nature conservation terms, simply abandoning much of the uplands to develop more naturally might be no bad thing, but the same can’t be said of the lowland wildlife sites.
And remember that Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty have about the same area as National Parks but collectively receive about the same Government cash as just one small one national park. Please don’t just focus on National Parks but on all protected landscape areas.
jbc – well that’s the type of debate we need to have. And quick!
If we did what I suggested,and increased the money for agri-environment spend (at the expense of Basic Payment), then there would be plenty of scope to do much better in both lowlands and uplands.
In fact, if, big IF, we had better designed a-e schemes we could do much. much better without any increase in money at all.
We need a debate (as the NGOs said) and I wonder how we are going to get one.
PS How do we get abandonment of the uplands, which might be akin to rewilding at times, without abandoning upland farming communities? Or is that what you are suggesting? That’s quite radical.
Well it’s a good time for radical thoughts, is it not?! I did say “in pure nature conservation terms” but essentially hill farming is dying of old age along with the farmers; why not help the transition be a positive one instead of fighting for a hard, lost way of life that too few youngsters want to follow now and which hasn’t been economically viable for decades.
They didn’t save the mining communities for sentimental reasons did they?
The problem with abandoning the uplands, which I am fine with in principle, is that they won’t be abandoned. This won’t be like the Western Isles in Scotland with tonnes of abandoned crofts which are still owned by the family for sentimental reasons (and which really ought to be bought out by the Scottish government) and just left to rot and let nature take over. The abandoned uplands will be snapped up by rich elites for shooting, hunting, and their general use as a private (wildlife abusing) playground. I can’t even suggest that a fund be set up to buy these abandoned lands for the good of the nation as the Tories are set on privatising anything publicly held in order to give it to their mates for a song.
This is complicated but not impossible. It would be great to rewild parts of our uplands and I agree that to do so we need transitional solutions (perhaps a range of different ones) that work for owners, tenants and common rights holders. If people are to get money for rewilding then such land needs to be locked into suitable management for a very long time….little point paying for rewilding for 10 years and then reverting to farming again.
It isn’t just a case of getting people to walk away though, it needs to be about establishing near-natural ecosystems and processes, which will still need management – depending where you are in the country this might be red or roe deer control, removal of straying stock, protection against accidental fire, footpath maintenance, removal of undesirable species like rhododendron or other invasive non-natives, reintroduction of lost species (animal or plant).
Mind you, I am also comfortable with rewilding lying at one end of a continuum – the other end being a suitable type of very extensive farming which could be supported by something reasonably similar to our current agri-environment schemes.
I’ve been putting some thoughts together (mine and others as you know) into a report on just this subject, which should be coming in about a month, so hopefully not too late! Without giving anything away, the People Need Nature view will not be a million miles away from yours Mark.
Public Goods for public money has to become the mantra that the whole movement uses. Differences may well arise as to how the value of public goods translates into payments to landowners. How much is a hen harrier worth, or indeed how much should a landowner pay per negative hen harrier or “hen harrier hole”. Here we go down the natural capital accounting rabbit hole.
I’m not sure there’s much to be gained in advocating for continued income support for farmers from environmental organisations, as many other more powerful voices will be making this argument. If we are to advocate income support, it would need to be linked to creating benefits for nature and/or society. Income support for all hill farming, for example, would be hard to justify when looking for benefits to nature, though supporting communities in transition to other more sustainable approaches to land management makes sense. Clearly some hill farming is very important for nature – such as in High Nature Value farming systems. But there is no straight read across from one to the other. If rewilding is to have a chance of getting off the ground (or getting on the ground) on the scale where it will really make a difference (much as I love Knepp) then it needs to happen in the uplands.
Perhaps I could write a guest blog for you when the report comes out?
Miles – indeed you may, please.
Given the forthcoming great shake up of Brexit(but don’t hold your breath) is this not a time to look at more radical solutions like land value tax? Especially given the land ownership pattern in the UK. Most subsidy systems still seem to end up benefiting the most well off compared to the poorest. Although I am not averse to public money going to support those in need or causes for the public good(discuss),I am averse to it going to those with the most power in this societies present set up.
Gerald -I’d love someone to write a Guest Blog about land taxes for here? Know anyone who would be interested?
You could ask Peter Smith from the Wildwood Trust. He is an advocate of both rewilding and LVT.
http://renegadeecologist.blogspot.co.uk/
http://www.landisfree.co.uk/agricultures-major-problems/
how would this help nature though Filbert? that is what I struggle with.
In the way upsetting a cartload of apples affects the spatial distribution and potential ownership of apples, I guess
The initial premise seems to be that there is “idle land” and ifit were taxed “they would have no incentive to hold on to idle land. This would bring a great deal of land on to the market at a low price.” where is that land?
You see the odd small field by a village of overgrown grass.
In Suffolk there is about the same area of land held as nature reserves in the hands of private individuals as the Suffolk WT has, to a farmer that is idle land but it is all in tiny parcels by agric standards. You could say they have no conservation value being small and scattered, so they could go, if you taxed people for holding them they probably would.
I have not had time to read further.
http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/richard-murphy/
Try Richard Murphy. He admires your work. If he can’t do an LVT blog himself he may well be able to give you another contact.
From the little I have learned about Land Value Tax and Georgism in general, it seems most likely to have an impact on developable land values, land banking by developers and the like, rather than the value of agricultural land.
Peter Smith at the Wildwood Trust is a strong advocate of LVT for nature, and he might well be interested in penning something for you. You can find him at @Peetasmith
Miles – thanks. I did once ask Peter whether he’d like to do this but I should follow up now.
I think LVT would indeed reduce agricultural land prices and thereby help repopulate the countryside.
If that’s an unpopular thought then look at on of the most bio-diverse countries in Europe, Romania. Loads of people working the hills, woods and valleys. Loads of wildlife, including mega-fauna.
Alas this won’t last for much longer given the trend in small landholdings being swallowed up by intensive farming.
If you follow the link, it shows that the NT (over £8m) and the RSPB (nearly £3.6m) were the first and second largest recipients of CAP in 2015. NE also received nearly £1m in EAGF payments.
It’s not clear how much the NT received just for conservation projects, but the figures for the RSPB and NE are staggering since they are both nature conservation bodies and nothing else. Apart from Hope Farm, which is obviously a farm, why are they receiving so much in agricultural payments? Nature reserves should be free from the effects of farming, not places that mimic it.
Since the CAP has provided such a lucrative income stream, it is easy to see why so many nature reserves in the UK are just extensions of farmed land and why these organisations appear so reluctant to rewild.
I’m not 100% sure I can answer your question properly, but I’ll have a go.
Nature reserves are still under land management, for which you can, sometimes, get payments. Additionally some land can receive Basic Payment Scheme funding: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/basic-payment-scheme
I’m absolutely not an expert on this so please don’t just take my word on it!
That said, I do think your criticism of the NT and the RSPB are unfair. Both organisations have spoken out against the CAP and both are calling for a reform of the system, something that I think is very brave considering the amount they currently get. I would hope that any new system will continue to benefit the good work that these organisations do, and might even provide better support for rewilding.
Many nature reserves need grazing, grazing is farming.
“Many nature reserves need grazing” – only if you want to create/maintain cultural landscapes at the expense of natural ones. I do agree though, that “grazing is farming”, when domestic cattle or sheep (non-native) are used in fenced areas with no exposure to the effects of predators.
Regrettably, there’s a big gap between many people’s desire for a healthy and productive countryside that is sustainably managed and provides opportunities for leisure and recreation, and the rather esoteric discussions about the specialist policy instruments needed to ensure these things happen.
Yes, alliances like this can be powerful. But their power comes from demonstrating that people care. And from articulating what those people want to see change and how. It doesn’t come from simply bandying about membership figures, if those members have not been engaged with the issue and involved in making the case.
I’m tempted to say that the best thing we could do is cut subsidies entirely and let all the upland farms which are uneconomic go to the wall (they can always get jobs as fruit pickers or house cleaners after the Brexiteers have kicked all the foreigners out), but unfortunately I don’t think that would increase nature as much as it would just have sudden increase in grouse moors as the rich take all the unused unproductive grazing land and use it for grouse or other upland pursuits.
I think the best thing that could be done though is that each farm is benchmarked (by an independent body) for the minimum and maximum amount of wildlife it could support in addition to farming and they start getting subsidies when they hit the minimum. I’m quite sure most would only aim for the minimum but I’m also sure that the fear of undershooting the target would be great enough they’d end up somewhere in the middle just in case. Throw in a duty to inform the police, and have to have an incident number in order to claim subsidies to say they reported to the police any reasons wildlife might be low as well as to claim subsidies if it turns out that wildlife crime is discovered in the area, of any possible wildlife crime that might be happening. Actually and genuinely make farmers the guardians of the countryside for a change. Make them the champions for wildlife if they want any cash.
Or they can take no subsidies and roll the dice. It’d also be pretty clear where the wildlife criminals were hiding out too.
Maybe I’m just tired but I’m not really sure who the audience is for this leaflet.
Collectively 6m members, impressive but ….
Conservation champions, campaigners ….
In anticipation of plenty of dislikes;)