Katie Hinde tells us why Compassion in World Farming supports the Farm for Scotland’s Future campaign and its call for a new farm funding system:
‘The Scottish Agriculture Bill must support farmers and crofters in the transition to sustainable farming. Changing how we farm and croft land is central to tackling climate change, restoring Scotland’s nature, and creating a sustainable food system. Effective government policy is fundamental to making this happen whilst supporting farmers, crofters and food production.
‘Nature-friendly and sustainable farming practices go hand-in-hand with higher farm animal welfare. By transitioning away from livestock monocultures and towards extensive, regenerative systems, higher-welfare farming reduces stocking densities and reintegrates animals with the land. This allows animals to display natural behaviours such as rooting and grazing whilst being free from crates, cages and other systems which cause intense stress and suffering.
‘To achieve these animal welfare and environmental outcomes, farmers and crofter need clear and accessible financial support from government. The Scottish Agriculture Bill must deliver on a new farm subsidy system which encourages and rewards the delivery of public goods, such as restoring nature and improving animal welfare, by assisting farmers in transitioning away from environmentally destructive factory farming practices.’
Katie Hinde is UK policy officer at Compassion in World Farming.
Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this blog are the author’s and do not necessarily represent the views of all the organisations backing the Farm for Scotland’s Future campaign.
By Dan Paris, advocacy manager, Scottish Environment LINK
There was good news and bad news in Scotland’s latest climate emissions statistics, published last week.
The good news is that our emissions have fallen significantly over the past decades, down nearly 50% since 1990. The bad news is that we missed our 2021 target, meaning we have even more ground to catch up.
In 1990, the baseline year for our climate targets, the biggest source of emissions was by some distance our energy supply. Our homes were powered by big, polluting coal-fired power stations that belched masses of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. The growth in renewables has allowed a dramatic decarbonisation of electricity, with emissions from energy falling by over 77%.
Other sectors of the economy, like industry and waste management, have seen similar falls in emissions. But one sector where progress has been stubbornly slow is agriculture.
Farming is now the second biggest source of climate emissions in Scotland, narrowly leapfrogging business emissions in the 2021 figures. Only transport is responsible for more greenhouse gases – and even the transport sector has seen emissions fall at nearly twice the rate as agriculture.
So should farmers replace oil executives as the climate villains in the public imagination? Well, of course not. The problem is not the decisions made by individual farmers – many of whom are making great efforts to farm in ways that are better for the environment. But those farmers operate under conditions set by both the market and, in large part, through government policy. And government policy has to date not done enough to mainstream a more sustainable approach.
The Scottish Government spends more than half a billion pounds a year on farm funding. The way that money is currently distributed is still a hangover from the decades-old Common Agricultural Policy, which has incentivised the growth of large-scale, intensive farming.
That approach comes with big problems. Emissions are one, and are bigger than just carbon dioxide. The most significant greenhouse gas produced by agriculture is methane. And many farms depend on nitrogen fertilisers, produced from fossil fuels and emitting nitrous oxide – which is 300 times more warming than carbon dioxide.
But the problems with our current food system go beyond just greenhouse gases. Farming is a major driver of biodiversity loss, with – as just one example – the use of pesticides threatening pollinators like bees.
You might think that this is all regrettable but simply the inevitable cost of a vital industry. After all, food production – and food security – are hugely important.
But, with the impacts of climate change and nature loss now undeniable, we must take an honest look at the systems we depend on – and how they will change on a warmer planet.
Food production requires more than a farmer with a field. Farming depends on the wider environment – healthy soils, populations of pollinators, and climatic conditions suitable for growing crops. There is no food security without a stable climate and healthy natural environment.
We know this because the impact is already here. In recent years the impact of extreme weather, including droughts, has had a major financial impact on Scottish farmers. And today food inflation is being driven in part by the climate impact on food producers across the world.
The Scottish Government will soon be taking forward an Agriculture Bill to replace the current system of farm funding. That new system must support farmers and crofters to produce food. But it must do so by supporting the industry to transition to ways of food production that are sustainable in the long run.
That won’t look the same on every farm – not every farmer will be organic, and not every field will integrate trees with their livestock. But, with farmers and crofters managing three quarters of our land, it is vital that we help agriculture to become part of the solution.
Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this blog are the author’s and do not necessarily represent the views of all the organisations backing the Farm for Scotland’s Future campaign.
New figures show that farming has become the second biggest source of climate emissions in Scotland. The way we produce food is also a major cause of the loss of Scotland’s nature.
But a growing number of farmers and crofters are changing the way they farm, working to make farming part of the solution to the nature and climate crises.
It’s crucial that the Scottish government’s Agriculture Bill, due later this year, creates a new farm funding system that supports what these farmers are doing, and helps ALL farmers and crofters make the transition to sustainable farming.
We spoke with Johnnie Balfour from Balbirnie Home Farms in Fife about the way his farming is evolving to be better for nature and the climate, about some of the problems with Scotland’s current farm funding system, and about what he would like the new system to do.
The Scottish Government must commit to a radical new system of farm funding to deal with climate change, environmental campaigners have said.
The call comes after new figures, published last week, show that climate emissions from agriculture have risen to become the second largest source of Scottish emissions.
The 2021 Scottish emissions statistics show that farming now emits more than the business sector, with only transport making a larger contribution to climate change.
The worrying figures come as Scotland missed its emission reduction targets following a rebound after the pandemic.
The Scottish Government is introducing an Agriculture Bill which will create a new system of farm funding to replace the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy.
The Farm for Scotland’s Future campaign, launched by a coalition of environmental and farmers’ groups, says that the new system must support farmers and crofters to produce food in ways that are better for nature and climate.
That can include reducing chemical fertilisers and pesticides, increasing land farmed organically, and integrating trees onto productive farmland.
The latest figures follow a stark warning from the Climate Change Committee (Dec 2022) that progress on reducing emissions from agriculture was far too slow.
“The way we farm is a significant driver of nature loss and a major source of climate emissions. But it doesn’t have to be this way.
“Many farmers and crofters want to produce food in ways that are better for the planet. But the current funding system doesn’t do enough to reward that.
“With agriculture now the second largest source of emissions in Scotland, it’s obvious that business as usual cannot be an option.
“We have a once in a generation opportunity to create a better system. It is essential that the Agriculture Bill delivers change – and quickly.”
Notes:
Between 2020 and 2021 there was an increase of 0.1 MtCO2e (1.9 per cent) in agricultural emissions.
Emissions from agriculture have fallen by 10.8% since 1990, compared to a Scotland-wide reduction of 49.2%. Agriculture has made the slowest progress of any sector in reducing emissions.
Who else is missing the weekly dose of wonder provided by the BBC’s Wild Isles series earlier in the spring? My five-year-old, usually more interested in cartoons, was mesmerised, and so was I.
I was struck by how many of the creatures and plants shown in the series live on or near farmland. This shouldn’t really be a surprise, since in Scotland farming and crofting cover around three quarters of our entire land area.
The last episode, Saving our Wild Isles – not broadcast, but on iPlayer – featured two farms where the farmers are working very intentionally to make their land a home for wildlife, as well as to produce food. Both have seen fantastic results, with flowers, insects, birds and mammals returning to the farms. In Scotland many farmers are similarly changing the way they farm, to allow nature back and to reduce climate emissions.
Scottish Environment LINK’s new Farm for Scotland’s Future report features farmers and crofters who are planting trees, reducing or eliminating chemical pesticides and fertilisers, improving the health of their soil, and increasing biodiversity on their farms. This is often a collaborative effort, with farmers and crofters working together, sharing knowledge and ideas, and inspiring each other to rethink the way they use the land.
These are the trailblazers, and what they are doing matters to us all. Without a stable climate and a healthy natural environment, there can be no food security. But unfortunately, government policy is lagging far behind, and currently does little to support farmers and crofters who are working to restore nature and tackle climate change, and little to encourage more within the industry to do so.
The Scottish government spends more than half a billion pounds a year on farming, but most of this is paid to farmers based on how much land they own, and not what they do with it. Not only does the funding system fail to address the nature and climate crises, in which agriculture plays a major role. It’s also deeply unfair, with the distribution of funding massively weighted towards a minority of large landowners.
Clearly, change is needed. There is strong public support for a better system – in a recent poll, 85% of people said they wanted public spending on farming to support methods that restore nature and tackle climate change as well as producing food.
The Scottish government says it wants to make Scotland a global leader in sustainable and regenerative agriculture, and is expected to introduce a new agriculture bill later this year. The farmers’ groups, environmental organisations and others calling for change hope this new legislation will pave the way for a much better, fairer system – one that works for nature, climate and people.
The question is, will the Scottish government have the courage to bring about the transformative change we so badly need? As David Attenborough reminds us, we only have a few short years to make a difference. The time to act is now.
Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this blog are the author’s and do not necessarily represent the views of all the organisations backing the Farm for Scotland’s Future campaign.
By Dr Joanna Cloy, soil scientist and senior project manager, Fidra
While we wait for the upcoming Agriculture Bill, expected Autumn 2023, let’s consider the often forgotten but intrinsically linked network of life in the soil. Research has estimated that in excess of a quarter of all species on Earth exist in soils. Ranging from tiny bacteria to large burrowing earthworms, this ‘underground livestock’ needs to remain biodiverse. Organic-rich healthy biodiverse soils will support crop productivity and provide more beneficial exchange of greenhouse gases.
Ways of protecting life in agricultural soils include management practices that maintain or boost soil organic matter. The use of no-till and diverse cover crops keep living roots in the soil year-round and crop rotations that include grass and nitrogen fixing clover leys build up soil organic matter and fertility.
It should be acknowledged, however, that organic waste-derived fertilisers such as treated sewage sludge (or biosolids), containing a cocktail of hidden pollutants such as microplastics and the forever chemicals ‘PFAS’, can be detrimental to soil biodiversity and the environment. Avoiding the contamination of agricultural soils and the environment is a ‘nature positive’ measure to protect soil health and the production of high-quality uncontaminated food. If we truly value Scotland’s soils, land managers must be encouraged to maintain or boost organic matter and soil health by feeding their ‘underground livestock’ through the application of high-quality uncontaminated organic materials.
Targeted funding is essential for encouraging Scottish farmers and crofters to restore nature through cutting emissions and enhancing biodiversity. Establishing baseline soil health and nutrient status enables sound management decisions that could reduce future inputs costs and improve farm business efficiency whilst benefiting the environment.
Practical guidance from SRUC (Scotland’s Rural College) encourages farmers to test the soil pH and nutrient status of their fields as testing is a vital first step toward successful soil nutrient management. The current National Test Programme provides essential funding for carbon and biodiversity audits and effective nutrient budgeting as well as access to support from qualified farm advisors.
The Scottish Government’s Vision for Agriculture and upcoming Agriculture Bill must take a holistic joined up approach to enable effective connections with the Natural Environment and Circular Economy Bills. Soils could be described as our greatest national wealth and now is the time to assess and maintain the health of those soils for sustained production.
Nature-based solutions that protect and restore ecosystems are often called upon as effective ways to tackle the challenges faced by society, such as climate change. As mentioned in a blog by the Soil Association, the role of organic farming and high nature value farming systems are critical. Farmers play a key role in future-proofing soil health and high-quality sustainable food production. As custodians of the land, they can help find positive pragmatic solutions for the future, reversing biodiversity declines resulting from poor management practices that damage and contaminate Scotland’s soils.
Join the Farm for Scotland’s Future campaign alongside charities, members of Scottish Environment LINK and farmers’ groups seeking positive changes for nature, climate and people.
Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this blog are the author’s and do not necessarily represent the views of all the organisations backing the Farm for Scotland’s Future campaign.
By Jo Riggall, grasslands advocacy officer, Plantlife
You may have heard of machair, an iconic and extremely rare grassland habitat that’s studded with wildflowers. But other types of species-rich grassland in Scotland are also worryingly rare, such as lowland hay meadows. These diverse habitats have developed over centuries, hand-in-hand with traditional farming and crofting practices, such as hay production and low-intensity grazing.
However, with the intensification of agricultural practices and other pressures, we now only have tiny remnants of these precious grasslands left. Today, most grasslands in Scotland are intensively managed and are extremely poor for biodiversity.
Farmers and crofters are at the heart of ambitions to reverse the loss of species-rich grasslands and boost biodiversity, whilst producing nutritious food. But these habitats also have an important, and often undervalued, role in climate change mitigation and adaptation. Species-rich grasslands require very little to no fertiliser or pesticide, so farmers and crofters can both save money on these costly inputs and avoid the carbon emissions that are released during their manufacture or use.
Other harmful impacts of fertiliser can also be avoided by managing species-rich grasslands, such as the deposition of nitrogen from ammonia emission. This can damage vegetation, run off into waterways and cause eutrophication (a process that results in the build-up of nutrients in bodies of water) – as well as harming human health through the formation of particulate matter. Species-rich grassland therefore contribute to cleaner air and water, which aren’t just essential for plants and wildlife, but for humans too!
The appropriate management of species-rich grasslands, which can include grazing or mowing in the right place at the right time, can help plants such as Scottish bluebell (Campanula rotundifolia) and Meadowsweet (Filipendula ulmaria) to flourish. Excitingly, it’s also this diversity of plant communities and their roots which support these grasslands to sequester and store carbon, as they’re able to draw down carbon into the soil and access water and nutrients – allowing them to also be more resilient in the face of drought.
Healthy soils of species-rich grasslands are full of abundance and diversity of microbes, mycorrhizal fungi and invertebrates, such as earthworms, that facilitate greater carbon sequestration and storage. It really is a virtuous circle of less carbon-intensive management practices helping to create more diverse communities of plants and fungi, which in turn can store more carbon.
This can be achieved in tandem with sustainable food production, as species-rich grassland requires grazing to ensure that rank scrub and vegetation doesn’t outcompete the more sensitive plants.
With grasslands covering 17% of Scotland’s land, they have huge potential to help achieve the Scottish Government’s legally binding targets on nature recovery and climate change mitigation and adaptation. To achieve this, farmers and crofters need to be supported so that many more of them can manage their land in a way that is multifunctional: enabling nature’s recovery, creating connected species-rich grassland habitats at landscape-scale, and helping to mitigate and adapt to the effects of climate change.
In its Farm for Scotland’s Future campaign, Scottish Environment Link has set out a positive vision for what this might look like. Read the report ‘Farm for Scotland’s Future: the case for change’ and be inspired to imagine a possible future of sweet-smelling hay meadows that thrum with bees, and pastures that are full of thriving wildflowers, fungi, and other wildlife.
Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this blog are the author’s and do not necessarily represent the views of all the organisations backing the Farm for Scotland’s Future campaign.
By Diana Garduño Jiménez, Food Justice Project Officer, Nourish Scotland
The Agriculture Bill is set to bring big changes in how we farm. At a technical level the changes might look like: decreasing the use of fertilisers, increasing cover crops or implementing regenerative grazing. But behind the implementation of any of these practices, there’s people.
While financial support for food producers in the transition is critical, support for farmers to meet, learn from each other, share advice and work in partnership, is just as essential. We need peer-to-peer knowledge exchange that supports farmers to try out new things.
We set up six small groups of farmers, crofters, and growers in different Scottish regions. Each partner organisation facilitated one of the groups. These groups visited each other’s farms, crofts, and market gardens. They went on farm walks, attended webinars, were part of WhatsApp groups, and shared meals.
So, this was not your standard knowledge exchange programme. It was especially not the hierarchical kind, where people are expected to sit down for hours and listen to ‘experts’ go on…and on…and on.
Through the programme we learned that knowledge exchange needs to create spaces where:
Everyone has something to share and something to learn.
Many of the visits were to group members’ own crofts or farms. Hosting others in a way that was friendly, social, and relaxed gave way to knowledge exchange. As we walked around farms the host would tell us about their farming practices. This could include anything from the use of trees to create shelter belts, to different approaches to composting. As we walked around, people would ask for more details on the methods used, sometimes suggesting alternatives or giving advice. As a group member said:
“It’s nice to show off what you are doing, even if it’s early days. You can get feedback from others and see whether everyone thinks what you are doing is good or whether they have other ideas. It’s a great opportunity”.
New entrants and veterans are involved.
This gives people who are new the opportunity to ask questions and get reassurance. For those who have been practising for longer, this can give them the opportunity to compare practices and share their knowledge. This intergenerational mixing can be key to changing practices:
“When you are the new one, people can look at you strangely. But others might want to learn more about why you are doing things differently. They might end up changing their practice!”
People feel supported and part of a network.
It’s scary to try things out on your own. But knowing that there are others out there who want to hear about your journey can make it that bit easier:
“Within the group it’s nice to have a space to say: “I’m trying mob-grazing”. It’s hard to put yourself out there, especially early on because you don’t know if it works. So, it’s nice to have the WhatsApp group to share things on a small scale.”
And can give you energy to keep going:
“The best thing about taking part was meeting people, learning from them and exchanging ideas. Above all, given hope and energy that change can happen.”
There’s an opportunity to get to know each other as people.
There can be anxieties about what being a ‘proper farmer’ means, or feeling judged by others who farm in different ways. Yet, when you have lunch together and learn that Lucy spends her holidays in cycling competitions, Mark is getting married in a couple of months, and Jaques is here learning from market gardeners before they start their own, the anxieties can fade away.
This can lead to opportunities for collaboration. As Pasture-Poultry group members said to a Biodiversity and Profitability group member:
“If you ever feel like experimenting with a new crop and it doesn’t work out, we would be more than happy to take that from you. We would give it to our chickens.”
Or as another farmer reflected:
“We focus on each other’s negatives instead of what we each do well. We could signpost customers to each other, tell them: “if you are interested in carbon reduction go with Greg…. or if you are interested in biodiversity and organics go to Saoirse.”
Ultimately, we focused on building trust.
Working in the agricultural sector is often lonely and precarious, taking a toll on producers’ mental health. As the policy context changes, food producers are being asked to manage increasing uncertainty. Knowledge-exchange groups can provide a valuable space for members to become aware, discuss, and understand policy changes. But crucially where people can feel inspired, safe, and supported to take risks by trying new practices with other people.
Peer-to-peer farmer-led knowledge exchange is critical for the transition to sustainable and regenerative farming in Scotland. It is something that we cannot afford to stop doing.
We are hoping to continue this project. If you are a farmer, crofter or grower in Scotland and would like to be involved please complete this form.
Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this blog are the author’s and do not necessarily represent the views of all the organisations backing the Farm for Scotland’s Future campaign.
By Ruth Taylor, Agriculture and Land Use Policy Manager at WWF Scotland and Andrew Midgley, Senior Land Use Policy Officer at RSPB Scotland
We need food. We need farmers. We need farmers to keep farming and managing the land. Let’s just get that out there straight away. This needs to be said because food production is often pitted against environmental recovery. But these things don’t oppose each other, we need both.
We are all too aware and understand that many in the farming industry feel attacked on all sides at the moment, and worry that an increasing focus on nature and climate will lead to a reduced focus on food production. But we have much more in common than our supposed dividing lines. Like many farmers, we too want to see plentiful, good-quality food produced, but we want to see it done whilst looking after nature and the climate at the same time. It’s in all our interests to ensure that the clean water, pollinators and temperate environment on which we depend are protected and restored and that’s why we at Scottish Environment LINK work hard to highlight evidence on declining nature and species. We know that this sometimes feels challenging to the farming industry – but it’s a challenge to policymakers first and foremost to help us all design systems that work for climate, nature and food producers alike.
Environmental organisations know that farmers are absolutely critical to reversing the declines we’ve seen in farmland wildlife and are a key part of the solution to the climate and nature emergencies that we all face. Sometimes our emphasis is more on the loss of wildlife than on framing farmers as part of the solution. It’s a tricky communications challenge for environmental organisations and we can do more to get the balance right.
We believe that farming and environmental interests are much more aligned than might be appreciated. Environmental organisations are arguing, for example, for the farming budget to be defended. At a time of incredible pressure on public finances, which, outside of the EU, could see agricultural budgets squeezed, we are working hard to make sure we continue to use public money to support Scottish farmers and crofters. While we may want to see some of this money spent differently in the future, we are fighting to keep the money coming to farming.
Another way in which our interests are aligned is in recognising that the farming system is integral to the continuing biodiversity interest in some instances. The interaction between farming and nature is complicated. Changing farming practices have resulted in declines in some species, but, at the same time, some farming practices play an important part in helping to protect wildlife.
Some types of extensive livestock farming can create the right conditions for nature to thrive and carbon stores to be protected: mixed grazing using native breeds helps to sustain diverse grasslands, which in turn support wildlife including corncrakes, butterflies and bees. Without this farming activity these species could be lost.
On the Western Isles, for example, low intensity cropping is an important feature of these so-called ‘High Nature Value’ (HNV) farming and crofting systems, with machair cultivation providing a rare habitat for wildflowers and birdlife. In effect, much of the farming activity in these areas is beneficial. Not everything is perfect but, in general, maintaining farming activity is important. Losing it would potentially result in more negative impacts for nature, as well as rural communities.
This is why, at the same time as pointing to the general declines in biodiversity, environmental organisations have been arguing that the Scottish Government should properly recognise and support ‘High Nature Value’ farming and crofting systems.
HNV farming and crofting is where the overall management characteristics of the system provide a range of environmental benefits, particularly maintaining and enhancing a wide range of habitats and species (such as butterflies and birds) that are considered to be of high nature conservation importance.
In Scotland, HNV systems are associated with farms and crofts where semi-natural vegetation makes up a high proportion of the available forage resource and where the livestock grazing that resource do so at low grazing densities. The Scottish Government developed an indicator on HNV farming about ten years ago and estimated that the area under HNV farming and crofting was around 2.4 million hectares of agricultural land. This equates to around 40% of the total agricultural land in Scotland.
Importantly, while we approach this with a particular interest in nature, these farming systems are also integral to rural communities, often in remote areas. We recognise that loss of farming activity would represent a challenge for the future of these communities.
To help wildlife we need all farmers and crofters throughout Scotland taking action and making nature and climate friendly farming the norm. We want to see future farming policy – and the payments given to farmers – encourage and reward this. However, there has to be better recognition within this new policy specifically for HNV farming and crofting systems given the current system of direct payments does not support them adequately.
We, therefore, see an opportunity in the new agricultural policy and funding regime that is being developed at the moment. The government could, if it wanted to, set out to design a system that properly supported HNV farms and crofts as part of a system that encourages farmers everywhere to take greater action for nature.
We are concerned, like others in the agricultural industry, that small farms and crofts might struggle to get the support they need under the proposed four-tiered framework and we think that targeted HNV support might provide an answer. We don’t have an oven-ready scheme to hand to the government, but we do think that the government could explore the creation of an HNV category with input from farmers and crofters and look at how this could be incorporated in the new framework. With this in mind, we have recently written to the Cabinet Secretary to ask that the government pick this concept up as a means of supporting those HNV farmers and crofters that already support nature.
Scottish Environment LINK sees potential opportunities for HNV support within the new framework. Perhaps HNV farms and crofts could be recognised for their HNV status. Equally, the government is going to have to look again at the Less Favoured Area Support Scheme and how it delivers support to areas that are considered constrained or less favoured. But perhaps we could turn that around: instead of being compensated for not being able to produce in the same way as those on better land, farmers could be rewarded for what they deliver in terms of High Nature Value.
We think there is an opportunity in the next few months; an opportunity to develop a new approach to supporting agriculture that benefits both farmers and nature. We just need the government to pick this up and explore it in detail, working with the industry and testing it on the ground.
By writing this article, we want to start a wider conversation. We need to find a way of creating spaces where the farming and environment interests can come together to find solutions to the problems we face. That means us putting forward ideas, whilst also listening to you and your industry and its concerns so that we can have honest and constructive conversations about how we meet the challenges we face. We are much more likely to meet those challenges if we do it together.
Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this blog are the author’s and do not necessarily represent the views of all the organisations backing the Farm for Scotland’s Future campaign.
The way we fund our farms is making climate change worse and risks our food security, according to a significant new report – which campaigners say makes the case for a radical approach to the upcoming Agriculture Bill.
Farm for Scotland’s Future: the case for change sets out how the Scottish government’s forthcoming Agriculture Bill can and must deliver for nature, climate and people through a transition to sustainable farming.
The report was commissioned by the Farm for Scotland’s Future campaign backed by 40 environment, farming and food organisations, and outlines the impact of agriculture on the climate and biodiversity in Scotland.
The report also highlights evidence that a warming climate and the continued decline of biodiversity are posing significant risks to our food producers through droughts, soil erosion and the loss of pollinators.
As it stands, agriculture is currently the third largest source of Greenhouse Gas emissions in Scotland, causing 18% of Scotland’s emissions in 2020. Current practices also make farming a major cause of wildlife loss. Scotland is ranked among the most nature-depleted countries in the world – the Biodiveristy Intactness Indicator ranked Scotland as 28th from bottom out of 240 countries. The report makes the case for reform and details farming practices which support nature, climate and food production with reference to key case studies in Scotland.
The main purpose of the upcoming Agriculture Bill is to rethink the current funding system for the sector, based around direct payments. The report shows that this system is unfair and inefficient, with the top 20% of claimants receiving 62% of the direct payments budget. A new system has the opportunity to incentivise ways of farming which prioritise climate and nature in harmony with food production, and contribute towards achieving a just transition.
“Scotland’s farmers and crofters play a vital role in producing food and managing our land. The new farm funding system must support them to do so in a sustainable way.
“But the current, decades-old system rewards land ownership, rather than good land use, and is failing to help the farmers who want to produce food while protecting the environment.
“Environmental crisis is already having an impact on food availability and cost. The Scottish government must deliver a new system that reflects the scale of the challenge and ensures that our farmers and crofters can produce food in climate- and nature-friendly ways.”
Ruth Taylor, Agriculture and Land Use Policy Manager at WWF Scotland, said:
“We know that nature-friendly farming brings benefits for people, animals, nature, and the climate. With lower emissions, healthy soils and livestock, and thriving nature, farming this way also makes good business sense.
“Research from WWF has shown that we have the potential to reduce our emissions and restore nature, while producing nutritious food that is accessible for all. However, the current policies suggested for agriculture get us less than halfway to where we need to be for Scotland to remain on track to reach net zero.
“This year, we have the opportunity to make sure Scotland leads the way on nature and climate-friendly farming. It is essential that we see strong leadership now from the Scottish Government to make sure that happens.”
Vicki Swales, Head of Land Use Policy at RSPB Scotland, said:
“This report underlines the important role farming must play in reviving the wildlife we have lost from our countryside over recent decades. As farmers ourselves, and as advisors to hundreds of other farms across Scotland, the RSPB sees the shift toward nature-friendly practices as essential if we are to improve the resilience of our food system.
“The Scottish public are deeply concerned about the loss of habitats and species. It is vital that MSPs take the opportunity of the Agriculture Bill to put sustainability, in every sense, at the heart of how we produce food and how we manage our land, as this will benefit us all.”
The campaign is supported by a wide range of environmental NGOs such as RSPB Scotland, WWF Scotland and the Woodland Trust and is advised by farmers’ groups.
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