NBA call for more cash for the uplands
14/03/05

The National Beef Association is putting together a proposal to Defra that will justify the spending of around £100 million a year to support the English SDA after the current £27.5 million HFA system ends in December 2006.

It is arguing that without a dramatically higher level of support to make up for the lower SFP rate forced on the SDA after farming organisations failed last year to agree on a two region system with a Moorland Line boundary there will be significant cattle population loss in the uplands and avoidable environmental, social and economic damage will be the result.

"We have told Defra that its sustainability targets for the uplands have no chance of being achieved unless more realistic funding is made available than is currently being discussed," explained the NBA's SDA committee chairman Christopher Thomas-Everard.

"Without more help than is at present on the table more sheep will be preferred to suckler cows, which are both labour and capital intensive, and there will be a rapid deterioration in the range of plants, insects, birds and mammals as well as a reduction in the farming workforce with its own damage to schools, post offices and other rural services."

According to the NBA this problem cannot be solved with sticking plaster and because Mrs Beckett has herself underlined the need to see that upland farming communities receive appropriate support from other sources it has said that something like £100 million should be used to fund the HFA's successor schemes so that upland sustainability is maintained.

"Environmental organisations have already confirmed that they anticipate an unwelcome fall of in the SDA suckler herd of about 35 per cent and we ourselves fear that the drop could be even steeper in those areas which have high concentrations of relatively small, family run, mixed holdings unless preventative action is taken," said Mr Thomas-Everard.

"We think the only way to ensure that SDA farms can continue to deliver good environmental management of their land is to spend substantial money on a tiered range of farm based schemes which encourage environmental targets that can only be achieved by keeping cows."

"Unless this level of financial commitment is made we cannot see how Defra will be able to introduce a Rural Development Programme that adequately reflects the needs of upland communities or the depth of public interest in the management of our hill landscapes," he added.