County offers unique farming platform for Government

David Hall, who is the National Farmers' Union (NFU) regional director north and co-chair of the outgoing Cumbria Local Enterprise Partnership's rural sector panel, said the county offers the Government a unique opportunity to work with close-knit regional bodies to develop an efficient and economically sustainable farming sector.

He added that the county could offer approaches and interventions that could be rolled out across the UK.

As the local enterprise partnership hands over its responsibilities for economic growth to Cumbria's two councils and creates new ways to deliver this, it has a message for politicians.

As David went on to explain:“Cumbria provides a unique platform for government, NGOs and the private sector, and specifically land managers, to demonstrate how when stakeholders work together, the UK’s food, climate, biodiversity, economic and social outcomes can be delivered at both scale and pace.

“New and emerging markets could provide significant opportunity across the county for farmers and land managers, as long as they are managed correctly. We can see beacons of good practice that integrate environmental gains and food production, and we need to showcase these to others across the county and nationally to demonstrate what can be achieved. However, as our Rural Sector Panel have been told, there can be unintended consequences of some schemes, such as a loss of food production and a reduction in local employment if schemes are not looked at in the round.

"We need to be aware of detrimental outcomes for food production associated with schemes like Biodiversity Net Gain and Nutrient Neutrality, which can deliver unintended consequences. Already, there is a concern that such schemes looked at in isolation could undermine the economic sustainability of farm businesses and wider regional economies.

“Therefore, we want to see food security treated as an absolute priority, with home-based production being valued and supported, including our important upland farming. In our area, the transition away from the CAP schemes has badly impacted some of our farmers and could further reduce long-term food security. So we also want to see increased funding of the agricultural budget and far greater pace in the roll out of this.

"Finally, there is a real need to look at taxation to ensure that there is a taxation system that encourages investment on-farm and that there are no changes to Agricultural Property Relief and Business Property Relief, as this will have a significant negative impact on farming businesses across the county”.

The Panel believes that Cumbria is the perfect test bed to demonstrate how these priorities can be delivered.

“Importantly, we also think that these priorities can be delivered alongside progressing environmental outcomes in a way that recognises economic viability as a cornerstone of sustainability. We believe this can be achieved in two ways.

“Firstly, the public and private sector and NGOs should be incentivised and upskilled so that they can provide a business and technical support service to farmers that fully integrates food production and environmental outcomes. Support that is tailored to individual businesses and which delivers economic sustainability in conjunction with the food and environmental outcomes.

“Secondly, through a new, government-led land use framework that would enable regional structures to help the farming sector get itself back into an economically sustainable position, a position where food production and environmental and biodiversity outcomes are seamlessly integrated.

“Cumbria’s economy, and in particular its visitor experience, is underpinned by a breadth of livestock farming that is representative of the best and most challenged in the UK. For this reason, Cumbria LEP’s Rural Sector Panel has been working for many years to build a shared understanding of all relevant stakeholders, including the NFU, the CLA, the Farmer Network, environmental organisations, private sector bodies and leading academic institutes.

“Recent meetings with Cumbria’s land-based advisors suggest there is an opportunity in Cumbria to work collaboratively with a committed body representing stakeholders, including farmers, environment bodies, the private sector and NGOs.
 

"We would ask the Government to work with us to develop a body that wants a thriving, economically sustainable food production sector balanced with delivering climate and biodiversity outcomes in a way that makes best use of private and government funds and resources,” concluded David.