Farmers call for Government rethink on how land should be prioritised

Farmers say they should be left to produce food to help feed the nation, rather than being pressured to fulfil their environmental requirements.

It comes as the war in Ukraine has sparked dramatic rises in the cost of farming – prompting an urgent plea for government action to bolster food security.

Farmers say rising food commodity prices, and very real concerns about availability, need to result in a rethink towards how land should be prioritised.

They have called upon the Government to encourage more people to produce their own food rather than prioritise the new progressive form of conservation called rewilding, something environmentalists have been calling for over the last few years.

The charity Rewilding Britain defines rewilding as the large-scale restoration of nature to the point it can take care of itself – restoring habitats and natural processes, and where appropriate reintroducing missing species.

It is calling for major nature recovery across at least 30 per cent of Britain’s land and sea by 2030, with five per cent of this being the rewilding of native forest, peatland, grasslands, wetlands, rivers and coastal areas, with no loss of productive farmland. The remaining 25 per cent would support nature-positive and regenerative farming and other uses that benefit local economies while allowing nature to flourish.

In 2020 Prime Minister Boris Johnson promised that the UK Government will support the recovery of nature and boost biodiversity by protecting 30 per cent of the country’s land by 2030.

But there are concerns that rewilding in Britain does pose a potential threat to its ability to produce food.

Richard Yates, who farms near Bridgnorth, says: "The Ukraine crisis has shown the importance of food security. The number one priority for any government should be to feed their own nations.

"We have the space, the climate, the right attitude of farmers, and we welcome the opportunities to be able to help do so.

"Since the Ukraine crisis and hyper-inflation, it has made our input costs rocket to unprecedented levels.

"Surely we have to pause our environmental desires to be able to responsibly and efficiently produce food.

"The dairy industry desperately needs labour, egg prices are poor, and some farmers are scratching their heads over whether they they think they can remain in business.

"The Government is very much focused on an environmental pathway, but they need to listen to farmers who wish to remain in business and need incentives to invest in their businesses.

"Our political masters simply don’t get it that UK farmers have no wish to mothball our fields and become park rangers.

"We have a spectacular landscape in south Shropshire, because it’s maintained and cosseted by our farmers, not left to ‘go native’."

Environmentalists say in order to halt the mass extinction of species and mitigate the effects of climate change, wilderness and biodiversity need to be protected.

On the face of it, the land demands of food production and rewilding seem to be mutually exclusive. Yet the achievement of truly sustainable food systems may depend on finding a way to reconcile them. This begs the question, can rewilding and farming ever be combined?

Supporters of rewilding say the two can co-exist, but that farming has to change given it is the biggest contributor to nature loss in the country.

They add rewilding, which can involve encouraging and supporting wildlife on-farm through replanting hedgerows as well as giving over unproductive land to nature, could help reverse the biodiversity decline.

The National Farmers' Union has set out plans for agriculture in the UK to reach net zero carbon emissions by 2040 without reducing livestock numbers.

Instead, the NFU said precision techniques, greater efficiencies, production of plant fuel on farms, and feed additives for cattle, would help the sector reduce and offset its carbon.

Georgie Hyde, NFU regional environment and land use adviser, says Shropshire farmers and growers are happy to meet the challenge of feeding the country.

“Our members are passionate about this, alongside the farmed environment and there is no-one better placed to manage the countryside than the farming community," she says.

“They are food producers, custodians of the landscape, entrepreneurs and businesspeople and they will make the right choices for their farms – many are invested in promoting habitat and species, much of it voluntarily.

“NFU nature discovery events in Shropshire over the past five years have shown an abundance of species on our farms and in our hedgerows, including red list bird species and important bugs, beetles and plants.”

Ms Hyde says that alongside putting food on our tables, Shropshire farmers and those across the country had more than 400,000km of hedges on their farms providing essential habitat for wildlife and had planted “10,000 football pitches worth of wildflowers to provide homes for pollinators”.

“Without farmers, including those in the Shropshire Hills, we would not have these cherished landscapes or the climate-friendly food they produce,” she adds.

“We have all seen the appalling scenes in Ukraine, and our thoughts are with the Ukrainian people at this time, and we are all seeing the global impact of the Russian invasion.

“For Shropshire farmers this includes spiralling feed, fuel and fertiliser costs and for us food security remains paramount – we need to see action to keep productive land in use for growing food and rearing animals.

“I am not convinced we can rely on imports given there are global pressures, nor should we, as many standards overseas are illegal here and we cannot just export our carbon footprint.

“Now is the time for Government to focus on food production and support and secure domestic supply, alongside sensible environmental delivery.”