Our advisors can provide professional advice with regard to all government Environmental Schemes, past and present, including Countryside Stewardship (CS), Higher Level (HLS) Environmental Stewardship, Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI), Farming in Protected Landscapes (FiPL) and England Woodland Creation Offer (EWCO). Since 2005, we have helped over 900 farmers and landowners apply successfully for Stewardship agreements. With our own in-house ecologists, we are unique among land agents in being able to offer a complete service.
Countryside Stewardship is the Government’s flagship on-farm environmental and woodland scheme. Our comprehensive range of services includes:
DEFRA has announced that the Sustainable Farming Incentive is relaunching in August 2023. A new SFI handbook has also been released with guidance for the SFI offer in 2023.
The 2023 scheme will be very different to the one launched in 2022, with a wider variety of “actions” available that farmers can be paid to undertake. Rather than being grouped together into “standards”, as they were in 2022, actions can be selected individually in a “pick & mix” approach. There are no minimum or maximum areas that can be entered into the scheme. In theory, these changes should make SFI more flexible and will allow farmers to choose the actions that will work best for their business.
There are now 23 actions available covering:
Click here to find out more on the Sustainable Farming Incentive 2023.
This scheme provides grants for projects undertaken by farmers in National Parks and Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty. Projects should aim to deliver one or more of the following:
We can advise on the likely success of a proposed project and help with the application process.
The Environmental Stewardship Scheme ran from 2005 to 2014 and is now closed to new entrants. H&H Land & Estates can provide ongoing practical advice on managing your HLS agreement, including:
