A new report by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has confirmed an underspend in the agriculture budget of over £300 million over three years.
The annual Farming and Countryside Programme report shows that there was an underspend of £130 million for the period 2023-2024, £103 million in 2022-2023 and £125 million in 2021-2022.
The previous Conservative government had a manifesto commitment to spend an average of £2.4 billion per year across the parliament (2020 to 2021, to 2023 to 2024).
In 2023 to 2024, Defra planned to spend £2,267 million as part of the planned trajectory for the agricultural transition.
The actual spend was £2,136 million, of which £110 million was spent under the Agriculture Act 2020.
Defra
The Farming and Countryside programme (FCP) continued the phased roll out of the environmental land management (ELM) schemes over the past year and expanded the range of grant offers available to the sector.
A total of £700 million was spent on agricultural environment schemes, including: Environmental Stewardship (ES); Higher Level Stewardship (HLS); and Countryside Stewardship (CS).
A further £23 million was spent on the Nature for Climate Fund (NCF) tree grants, to support the delivery of several projects, including the Woodland Creation Accelerator Fund, community forests, along with promotion and engagement.
In addition to the £2,136 million spend, £11.4 million worth of SFI payments were paid out to farmers in 2023 to 2024 but will be accounted for in 2024 to 2025.
Defra stated that there will be an increasing level of spend through the Agriculture Act, as the FCP continues to introduce new schemes based on domestic powers, and close old schemes which rely on EU powers.
Reaction
Country Land and Business Association (CLA) president Victoria Vyvyan described the programme as “good”, but said that “now is not the time to falter”.
“The UK government is building a new way of working with farmers and land managers to deliver good outcomes for food and for the environment, and we will need our full budget to make it work.
“The government’s ambitions are the right ones, but they cannot be delivered on a shoestring,” Vyvyan said.
She added that next month’s budget should commit to an annual £3.8bn farming budget to “safeguard the future” of landscapes and rural businesses.
