Now published, the message from the roadmap is clear: government has a long-term vision for a profitable, productive, resilient and sustainable farming sector, but the roadmap is intended to provide a framework for its vision, not a detailed delivery plan.

The Farming Roadmap read alongside the government’s response to Baroness Minette Batters’ Profitability Review (Batters’ Review) provides the visionary concept and outlines the progress already made, while acknowledging there are areas within the sector that are yet to be tackled.

Importance

The roadmap confirms that food is one of the UK’s critical national infrastructure sectors. Meanwhile, the Defra Nature Security Assessment identified that ecosystem degradation leads to significant risk to food production – the future must be an integrated approach to food production and environmental protection and recovery. 

Complexity

The roadmap looks to envelop existing government documents and statutory requirements from the Climate Change Act 2008, the Environment Act 2021, the Environmental Improvement Plan, the Carbon Budget and the Growth Delivery Plan, the Land Use Framework and the Good Food Cycle. Bringing all of these together is vital for collaboration; however, the direction of travel within the roadmap appears to be increased regulation in order to meet targets set out in many of these documents.

An area I am keen to watch develop is the encouragement that Defra is giving to cross-government working with the aim of “ensuring farming is reflected in decisions on growth, infrastructure and regulation.” While only a sentence in a long document, this is what the sector needs – Defra to be recognised and reflected in other government departments.

The government’s ambition

The government’s ambition is to have profitable farms that maintain domestic food production, fair rewards for farmers that produce that food, good jobs and clear career paths, and a sector helping to restore nature and meet climate goals, and contributing to the growth of the British economy. Within the Farming Roadmap, the government has agreed to:

• Set a clear direction
• Ensure markets function effectively and fairly
• Provide long-term certainty and incentives
• Embed established approaches into regulation

However, the roadmap states that as private markets mature and sustainable practices increase, government will step back and withdraw support where it is no longer needed. While this feels a practical approach, there are questions around implementation and where the support will be re-directed.

In summary, the Farming Roadmap, taking into account the Batters’ Review, outlines the government’s vision for its role in driving a profitable, productive, resilient and sustainable farming sector. The industry has long called for the ability to lead itself and now it has the opportunity to do so within this framework.

As the roadmap states, delivery will be ongoing and so will the discussions with farmers and stakeholders. Collectively working with government, the sector and others, the vision is certainly one the industry can get behind, support and drive forward.

Further information

Contact Kelly Hewson-Fisher