Latest Defra survey ’falls short of expectations’

The latest Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) survey on the Campaign for the Farmed Environment (CFE) released today shows it continues to fall short of expectations.

Crucially, it is failing to achieve one of its core purposes – retaining and increasing the area of uncropped land to maintain the environmental benefits of the now abolished set-aside scheme. And the task of providing these benefits is not being met by all farmers. Following a review, the Government is due to decide on the future of the CFE later this year.

Ian Woodhurst, CPRE’s farming campaigner said, "Given these disappointing findings it’s important that the Government conducts a thorough review. We believe it’s important that farmers are clear about what’s expected of them and that they all need to contribute towards making farming practices more environmentally sustainable."

Following the publication of the survey, the Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) is calling for the review of the CFE to address three key areas of concern:

• How the CFE can ensure all farmers help improve the environmental quality of England’s farmed environment. While many farmers are doing good things through the CFE, they continue to be let down by others who appear unwilling or reluctant to play their part.

• A rigorous appraisal of whether the voluntary approach of the CFE has provided better value for money than a mandatory requirement for all farmers, taking into account all the costs expended by the organisations involved.

• How the CFE will work alongside proposed reforms to the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) that aim to make the CAP deliver more for the environment.

The voluntary approach of the CFE has helped government agencies, farming and wildlife organisations work more closely with farmers to introduce vital green farming measures in some areas.

But CPRE remains sceptical about whether a voluntary approach will ultimately be as effective as a simple requirement for all farmers to put a small percentage of their land into environmental measures.

Defra has put around £1.5m of public money into the CFE and it has to rely on Government agencies and farming and wildlife organisations to persuade farmers to pitch in, and publicly funded green farming schemes to deliver its aims.

The partner organisations involved have contributed enormous amounts of time, money and effort to try to make the CFE work. Yet surveys suggest a hard core of farmers are still unwilling to participate.

Ian Woodhurst concluded, "It’s likely that forthcoming reforms of the Common Agricultural Policy will introduce further environmental requirements for farmers so the CAP delivers more public benefits. The reforms provide an opportunity to introduce measures that recognise the work of those farmers who are doing their bit for the environment, and to prevent others from doing very little or nothing at all."