Government applauded for putting the environment at the heart of post-Brexit farming proposals

27 February 2018

Commenting ahead of the Command Paper for the Agriculture Bill, launched today, Dr Elaine King, Director of Wildlife and Countryside Link [1], said:

‘The Secretary of State has outlined a bold vision for our farming future, taking onboard many of our proposals. With less than forty years of farming fertility left in our soils, and wildlife and plant populations plummeting, turning this vision into a reality is critical to ensure a bright future for farming, the environment and animal welfare.

‘We applaud the Government for recognising that the environment must be at the heart of a thriving farming industry post-Brexit. This could be a turning point from the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy which left our soils, waters, wildlife and plants suffering.

‘What we need to see now, to back-up this ambition, is funding based on robust costings, a targets-led approach and a timescale for moving to this commendable new vision for farming.’

ENDS

Notes to editors:

1. Wildlife and Countryside Link is the biggest coalition of wildlife and environment charities in England, and operates as part of a UK-wide coalition - Environment Links UK.

Key Facts and Figures:

• More than one in 10 UK plant and wildlife species face extinction, 165 species are considered to be critically endangered, with numbers of the UK’s most endangered species having fallen by two-thirds since 1970 (RSPB State of Nature Report)
  
• 56% of UK species have declined since the 1970s (RSPB State of Nature Report)
• The UK is ‘among the most nature-depleted countries in the world’, according to the Biodiversity Intactness Index
• Policy-driven agricultural change has been by far the most significant driver of UK wildlife declines: https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0151595