Thousands sign petition calling for more support for England's uplands

Thousands of people have signed a petition demanding more support for England's uplands and a rethink on its shake-up of agricultural payments.

A Cumbrian farmer has penned an open letter to Defra accusing policymakers of overlooking upland areas and leaving farmers in those places without adequate financial backing.

James Robinson, who is the vice chair of the Nature Friendly Farming Network (NFFN), said that new agri policy was not helping upland farmers, with far fewer of them being able to access higher tier agreements.

The open letter demands an increase in access to land management schemes such as the Higher Tier of Countryside Stewardship and Landscape Recovery, allowing a minimum of 3,000 agreements to be created per year.

Mr Robinson warned that successful applications to these schemes had plunged by 80% in the space of a decade.

And Defra should also provide a 'clear roadmap' to show how farm policy and payments would change between now and 2030.

Nearly 3,000 people have signed the Cumbrian dairy farmer's petition calling for more support.

Mr Robinson, who farms at Strickley Farm, a 300-acre organic dairy farm near Kendal, said the petition "shows the level of feeling there is within the industry".

"Small, upland and marginal farms have the potential to do so much for nature and climate, joining up food production with ambitious environmental goals.

"Environmental and biodiversity gains and habitat creation are all best delivered through higher-tier schemes with a whole-farm approach.

"If we want to make real change farmers with ambition need to be rewarded and supported with the right schemes and payments."

He said farmers who missed out on payments were “bitterly disappointed”, a situation he described as “unacceptable” as it put farms in upland areas and on marginal land out of business.

Leaving this unaddressed, Mr Robinson warned, would be a “deep betrayal” of farmers in upland areas.

He added: "Defra needs to listen, they need to read the letter and look at all the signatures. They will see there's a groundswell of support for higher-tier schemes.

"They then need to make sure that every farm that has the ambition to help nature at a whole-farm scale has the ability to do so."