The closure of the government’s sustainable farming incentive (SFI) is the big news this week. The SFI pays farmers in England to manage land to protect soil, restore hedgerows and boost nature recovery – the ‘public money for public goods’ mantra first mooted by Michael Gove (remember him?) – but there is no money left.
“With record numbers of farm businesses in farming schemes and the sustainable farming budget successfully allocated, we will stop accepting new applications for SFI from today,” Defra said on Tuesday. The NFU was reportedly given only minutes of warning before the coffers closed. Farmers that had planned to apply are, unsurprisingly, furious.
The organic sector is outraged too. “This damaging move by government seriously risks the viability of the organic sector and threatens the supply of sustainable British food,” said Soil Association chief executive Helen Browning. “It has frozen farmers out of the opportunity to meet the rising demand for organic food, which will instead continue to be met by imports.”
Organic food and drink reported some encouraging sales figures last month but the joy hasn’t lasted long. Conventional farmers warned that they may have to push harder on production and we all know what that means for biodiversity, chemical use and climate change.
A reformed SFI is now being planned, the government said. As ever, the minister responsible put a positive spin on things. “More farmers are now in schemes and more money is being spent through them than ever before. That is true today and will remain true tomorrow,” said Daniel Zeichner, minister for food security and rural affairs. “We have now successfully allocated the SFI24 budget as promised,” he added.
That the government has managed to further alienate the farming community is impressive given the ire over inheritance tax that has persisted, and intensified, since the autumn budget. “Farm business confidence has reached historically low levels, bypassing the record lows set last year, and this all before Defra delivered another hammer blow to farmers through the precipitous closure of Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) applications last night,” the NFU reported on Wednesday this week. This year, short-term confidence has decreased by another 10 points to -35 and mid-term confidence has dropped by 16 points to a “worrying” -38.
At least farmers can count on their customers, like the supermarkets. Sainsbury’s chief executive Mark Roberts said at the Sustainable Food Conference recently that he wanted to bring “more confidence” into the supply chain, through a “change in mindset and focus and a fair baseline”. He highlighted the issues in the egg supply chain that “really hammered home to us that we did not hold close enough the relationships with the farmers that we were working with; it also underlined the fragility of short-term thinking and short-term ways of working”.
In the current climate, farmers could be forgiven for thinking of the short-term. The likes of Sainsbury’s also have a short-term problem – and it’s one they are apparently ignoring. “Food retailers are ignoring the methane problem hidden in the meat and dairy aisles and risk losing consumer trust,” said Gemma Hoskins, global methane lead at Mighty Earth, which along with Planet Tracker has assessed retailer commitments and targets for the new Methane Action Tracker.
Methane is a short-lived, powerful greenhouse gas that requires urgent attention. This means on-farm actions – like those methane-suppressing feeds that have been in the news – but also changes to portfolios. Tesco, Carrefour, Schwarz Group (Lidl), and Ahold Delhaize have made commitments to grow their plant-based ranges, but most other retailers globally scored zero points on that particular indicator. What’s more, only six of the 20 retailers assessed currently report on their scope 3 emissions.
“In food, scope 3 reduction has to start with your portfolio,” said Alan Hayes, an ESG and net-zero consultant and advisor to major food brands. “Continuing to fill shelves with high scope 3 emissions food dwarfs any incremental improvements on farm.”
His comments came on the back of an announcement from Waitrose that it was offering up £0.5m to help British farmers cut their emissions. More than 2,000 farms in its supply chain were encouraged to apply – which equates to £250 per farm. Or, as one expert noted, 20p per tonne of greenhouse gases across the supermarket’s 2.4MtCO2 in scope 3.
Elsewhere in Footprint news this week:
· More detail on that new methane scorecard exposing a ‘blind spot’ in food retailer climate plans. More
· The future for organic wine is rosy, as consumers look for chemical-free tipples and producers seek climate and nature-resilient systems. More
· FAO guidelines on sustainable aquaculture are criticised for sidelining the sentience of fish like salmon. More
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