Sustainable Farming Incentive 2024 will have over 102 options. Farmers can submit this expression of interest to be part of a controlled roll out and the scheme will open for applications in late July. We provided a summary of the announcement in last week’s ENews and analysis of the offer for upland farmers is below. We will provide updates for grassland farmers in next week’s edition.
The Manage grassland with very low inputs option at £151/ha can be supplemented with:
- Haymaking supplements – either GRH7 at £153/ha which requires fields to be shut up for 8 weeks in Spring/Summer, or GRH8 at £187/ha which requires 9 weeks closure. Both have a cutting date after 15th July in SDAs.
- Keeping native breeds at risk on grazed land supplement - £92/ha/year if 50%-80% of the Livestock Units (LUs) are native breeds (SPM2), increasing to £146/ha/year if over 80% (SPM3). For sheep, these breeds include the Herdwick, Dalesbred and Teeswater and the full list is here.
- Cattle grazing supplement (non-moorland) - £59/ha if an average of at least 60% of the LUs on the land entered into the base action are cattle.
- A Lenient grazing supplement of £28/ha.
There are new SFI moorland options and a range of supplements.
| MOORLAND OPTIONS | PAYMENT | SUMMARY |
| Assess moorland & produce a written record
|
£10.60/ha/yr.
Plus £272/SFI agreement/year & £7/ha on commons |
Survey 1 point/10ha each year to assess and record the soil, vegetation, historic & archaeological features on the moorland. |
| Moderate Livestock Grazing on Moorland | £20/ha/year | · Less than 0.16 LUs/ha/year at any time
· No supplementary feeding apart from mineral licks |
| Low Livestock Grazing on Moorland | £53/ha/year | · Less than 0.08 LUs/ha/year at any time
· No supplementary feeding apart from mineral licks |
| Limited Livestock Grazing on Moorland | £66/ha/year | · Less than 0.04 LUs/ha/year at any time
· No supplementary feeding apart from mineral licks |
| SUPPLEMENTS | PAYMENT | SUMMARY |
| Keeping cattle and/or ponies on moorland | UPL4 - £7/ha/year
UPL5 - £18/ha/year UPL6 - £32/ha/year |
UPL4 – cattle/ponies > 30% LUs
UPL5 – cattle/ponies > 70% LUs UPL6 – cattle/ponies 100% LUs |
| Shepherding livestock on moorland | UPL7 - £33/ha/year
UPL8 - £43/ha/year UPL9 - £45/ha/year UPL10 - £48/ha/year |
Minimise livestock access to ‘sensitive features’ either by shepherding or use of temporary fencing. Higher payments for seasonal livestock removal.
· UPL7 – No livestock removal · UPL8 – 4 months livestock removal · UPL9 - 6 months livestock removal · UPL10 - 8 months livestock removal |
| Keep native breeds on extensively managed habitat | SPM4 £7/ha/year
SPM5 £11/ha/year
|
· SPM4 – between 50%-80% of grazing livestock units on moorland or are on the native breeds at risk register.
· SPM5 - more than 80% of total LUs. |
- Some of the other options for upland farmers to consider include:
- Manage rough grazing for birds at a disappointing £121/ha.
- Manage Priority Species Rich Grassland at £646/ha – this is a 5year option which will require endorsement from Natural England.
- Maintain dry stone walls at £27/100m
- Maintain weatherproof traditional farm or forestry buildings at £5m2
All these payments are per year and most SFI agreements are for 3 years. There is an additional management payment of £40/ha for the 1st year and £20/ha in the 2nd and 3rd year capped at 50ha. Later in 2024, Defra will introduce:
- an educational access action
- more endorsed SFI actions for farmland wildlife and habitats on grassland, heritage, wood pasture, orchards, coastal habitats and waterbodies.
How can I find out more?
This is a very short summary of just some of the options upland farmers may want to consider. There are links within the options outlined above and you can read the full guidance notes at: Sustainable Farming Incentive scheme: expanded offer for 2024 and the Defra blog about SFI2024.