The Farming and Countryside Programme’s annual report is out, highlighting how funding has helped farmers, foresters, and land managers support nature, sustainable food, and innovation. In addition to this, guidance for Countryside Stewardship Higher Tier applications is available, with the online service opening next week for invited applicants who have completed pre-application advice.
In September, the new Countryside Stewardship Higher Tier (CSHT) service will open for applications to those who have been invited to apply, have received pre-application advice and have completed any preparatory work.
The Capital Grants offer is now open for new applications. This new round will make £150 million of funding available to farmers, land managers and rural businesses for practical environmental improvements across England.
Following the Spending Review, Defra has secured a multi-year funding commitment from HM Treasury. More than £2.7 billion a year will be invested in sustainable farming and nature recovery from 2026 to 2029. Funding for the Environmental Land Management Schemes paid to farmers will increase by 150% over this time period.
To bring HLS payment rates closer to those offered under CSHT and SFI, we’re investing £30 million to increase payments for most HLS options. The rates are now on GOV.UK.
Nature markets allow individuals and businesses to pay for the benefits that nature provides, often supporting environmental conservation and restoration efforts. A new standard aims to bring clarity and confidence to nature markets.
Following the temporary closure of the Capital Grants scheme in November 2024, we’re pleased to share that we’ve secured sufficient funding for Capital Grants for 2025/26. This means we can now process the 4,040 completed Capital Grants applications that were on hold.
Earlier this month, we hosted a webinar for farmers and land managers in England to learn more about Countryside Stewardship Higher Tier (CSHT) and the pre-application process. In this post, you’ll find a recording of the webinar and a summary of the information in the session, reflecting the questions put to the team.
Ahead of the improved Countryside Stewardship Higher Tier (CSHT) scheme opening for applications, we’ve published the new scheme guidance on GOV.UK. In this post, we share a summary and a recording of a webinar held on 8 January.
As a result of unprecedented demand, some of the capital grant offers for farmers has temporarily closed to new applications. In this post, we summarise the changes to capital grants.
