Farmers are anxiously awaiting further detail from the government on imminent changes to their subsidy payments, with many reluctant to trust the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) to manage the transition, the leader of one of the UK’s biggest farming organisations has said. “Quite a few have said to me: ‘Well, we’re not at all clear what Defra is doing,’” Mark Tufnell, the recently installed president of the Country Land and Business Association (CLA), told. Brexit means the UK has left the EU’s common agricultural policy, under which farmers received about £3bn a year in payments allocated based on the amount of land they farmed. Tufnell said the future of farming was more than ever in the hands of the government, with trade deals, problems with the planning system, and the new system of ELMs. “We may end up with more people claiming from a limited pot, meaning that the individual will end up receiving less,” he said.

Source: The Guardian December 14, 2021 13:22 UTC