Skip to main content

This blog post was published under the 2015-2024 Conservative Administration

https://defrafarming.blog.gov.uk/2024/01/24/watch-an-ofc-and-sfi-special/

Watch: an SFI special from Oxford

Posted by: , Posted on: - Categories: Conversations we're having, Sustainable Farming Incentive

Seated audience at OFC 2024

Earlier this month, we attended both the Oxford Real Farming Conference and the Oxford Farming Conference (OFC).

In this post we'll share 2 videos.

The agricultural transition and environmental land management

The first video is a session hosted by Jim Egan and Jonathan Baker at the OFC.

Jim is Sustainable Farming Adviser at Frontier Agriculture (sponsor of the event) and Jonathan is Deputy Director in Defra's Farming and Countryside Programme.

Jim sets the scene for environmental land management. He gives a practical overview of the Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI). 

Jonathan shares the ambitions, plans and progress of the programme, with a summary of the recent Agricultural Transition Plan update.

The session includes a Q&A.

Farmer opinion

The second video features clips from the Oxford Real Farming Conference, including a discussion on Soil Health at Scale with Iain Tolhurst MBE.

We video also includes interviews with farmers John Geldard and Ben Taylor-Davies.

John gives his opinion on the work of the team and Ben describes his experience with SFI and plans for his farm.

Learn more

Jonathan recently posted a summary of the ATP update on the blog. It includes details of scheme payment rates, premium payments, new actions and plans for a single application service.

If you'd like to explore how SFI can work for you, visit our dedicated site. If you apply for an SFI agreement today, you will receive your first payment 4 months after your agreement starts. After that, you’ll be paid every 3 months, so you'll have a regular, reliable income.

If you're ready to apply, colleagues from the Rural Payments Agency (RPA) produced a step-by-step guide on YouTube. 

Finally, we're publishing a series of posts on the new SFI actions by sector so look out for those. By subscribe to the Farming blog you'll receive an email notification whenever a new post is published.

Sharing and comments

Share this page

Leave a comment

We only ask for your email address so we know you're a real person

By submitting a comment you understand it may be published on this public website. Please read our privacy notice to see how the GOV.UK blogging platform handles your information.