Britain’s nature is in crisis. We are one one of the most nature depleted countries in the world, with more than 200 species at risk of extinction. If you just followed debates online or in parliament you would assume that the biggest issue for nature is building. Discussion of nature restoration revolves around planning policy for buildings, not payments to farmers to protect and restore nature. Yet just 7% of Britain’s land is built on. 69% is agricultural land. Nearly a quarter of agricultural land is upland sheep farms. In most recent years the price of wool does not even cover the cost of shearing a sheep. Just 1% of our calories come from lamb. But these farming businesses have been kept on life support by public money: most upland hill farming income now comes from subsidies rather than food production. Britain’s uplands are stark, open spaces. This is not ‘natural’. Many of these landscapes were once forests. Some were even ‘temperate rainforests’ a landscape once widespread, now almost entirely destroyed. We should restore at least some of these landscapes. And, as the sheep farmer James Rebanks has put it. “There is a simple mechanism for transitioning farming to create landscapes you want – pay farmers to do it, pay them fairly at an appropriate rate, and ensure that the payments are guaranteed for long enough for them to be viable.” In Scotland and Wales we still mostly do the opposite. We subsidise farmers to keep grazing the hills. In England, on paper, things have changed. But things are happening far too slowly. Three years ago 56 ‘Landscape Recovery’ projects were announced. Just 3 have moved from planning to delivery. Every project must be over 500 hectares (the size of a small town) requiring many farmers to work together and the creation of new legal entities. To convince government that they are ready to begin work, farmers have founded they need to hire project managers, stakeholder consultation specialists, green finance consultants, solicitors, and accountants. So far so projects have spent £37 million of taxpayer money on design work. Government has also inserted a ‘ ‘termination for convenience’ clause which they can exercise at any time . Farmers who have committed to multi decade projects can have the rug pulled from under them. If we want to restore nature, instead of arguing about building on car parks in big cities we should instead focus on getting the right deal for farmers. Government needs to make an offer to farmers on nature that is credible and does not need an army of consultants to access. Until then, sheep farmers are going to keep trying to make their money from sheep. Read more here: britishprogress.substack.com… All credit to @TomGegg and Ted Theisinger (who is too sensible to be on here).