Julia Aglionby - Why we all need to work together fast on the countryside

I’ve had the pleasure of living in Cumberland for the last 34 years moving as a teenager to the county my father’s forebears came to from France in the late 11th century as early economic migrants.  I’m passionate that our countryside is for us all and access to opportunities for working, living and playing here must be broadened. Currently we suffer from an ageing population with increasing job vacancies yet there are huge opportunities for developing our land based and green economy. This is why I’m involved with the Food, Farming & Countryside Commission in the development of a Land and Nature Skills Service for Cumbria– do click here to read more.  

 The building of a vibrant countryside is something that concerns all of us whether we live in urban or rural settings as not only does it produce food and many public goods our stunning landscape also underpins the tourism economy. In Cumbria tourism employs 26% of the working population and is valued at over £3 billion comprising 20% of our economy. But the people who manage this countryside are being badly let down by this Government and this is bad for our environment, food systems and rural communities; all of which, as Henry Dimbleby eloquently explains, in ‘Ravenous’, are in deep trouble.

 My particular concern at the moment is the future of the people who live and manage the 24% of England that is designated as National Parks and Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONBs).  These areas were designated for the beauty of their landscapes as well as nature and as places for recreation for all of us.  Over the last seventy years, we have asked more and more from our national landscapes sending conflicting messages to the farmers who look after the land, for over 80% of these areas are farmed or grazed.  The net result is a situation of increasing conflict and polarisation over the future of how land is managed particularly in the uplands and other more marginal land much of which is in AONBs and National Parks.  

 Nearly 75 years ago in 1949 the National Parks Act was passed and at that time England still had food rationing so understandably the next 40 years were spent encouraging farmers to maximise output via production via price support and headage payments on cattle and sheep. Then in the early 1990s as an awareness of the impact of these policies on our environment gathered pace Environmentally Sensitive Area (ESA) schemes were introduced. For a further 10 years until 2005 farmers were simultaneously paid by one scheme per head of livestock they kept and by another, the ESA scheme, to reduce their livestock numbers. Somewhat Bonkers.

 Now twenty years on we are left with the opposite issue; instead of a plethora of schemes we have one payment scheme, the BPS, being phased out before the new offer, the Environmental Land Management scheme (ELM) is fully phased in.  This is in effect leaving farmers in these precious but delicate and challenging environments hung out to dry. I have modelled the likely farm business income in 2028/29 and compared it with a baseline of Defra’s figures for three years from 2019 to 2022.  For upland farmers by 2028/29 their Farm Business Income is set to have dropped by 50% compared with the baseline. We so far appear to have bungled the great opportunity to secure the rich cultural heritage of these landscapes while embracing nature rich, carbon storing farming systems.   

 If we were to liken the countryside to a Lego model the farmers, foresters, wallers, hedge layers and conservation managers would be the ‘studs’ holding the Lego blocks together. Mostly self-employed people working in family businesses ‘studs’ are critical to securing a healthy and more dynamic countryside.  By pushing these businesses towards bankruptcy and an earnings equivalent of £4.30 per hour we are shearing off these studs risking the collapse of these precious landscapes. This is contrary to an ambition for levelling up the regions of the UK and also will have negative consequences for nature and climate as well as the landscapes that millions of us visit every year. We will all be the poorer.

Thankfully there is an alternative future; a commitment to turbocharge the rollout of ELM and fairly pay those managing the 24% of England would deliver for our natural and cultural heritage and transform for the better the communities, landscape and nature of our National Parks and AONBs. The current budget of £2.4 billion is not sufficient to secure all we seek from England’s countryside. Personally, I think securing the future of 70% of England is worth more than 0.24% of the UK Government’s annual expenditure. How, and how much, we spend is a political choice. 

 Julia Aglionby is a Professor in Practice at the University of Cumbria’s Centre for National Parks and Protected Areas. She also Chairs the Uplands Alliance and is Executive Director of the Foundation for Common Land. She is a member of the Liberal Democrats and stood as a candidate in the 2019 General Election.