Correspondence: Defra future farming consultation: Environment Agency response

Defra have consulted on the future of policy for farming and the environment in England once we leave the European Union. See the full Defra consultation document. This consultation provides a once in a generation opportunity to inform the shape of future policy.

The Environment Agency welcomes the ambition set out in this consultation paper and the opportunities which come with a new approach to our food and farming sector.

To seek the right change for the agriculture sector and the environment, the Environment Agency would like to outline 8 key priorities towards ensuring a more sustainable future:

• protection of environmental standards in future trade agreements
• clear environmental baseline standards ingrained in regulation
• public funding to farmers should be conditional on ensuring these baseline regulatory conditions are met
• public funding should be for ‘public goods’
• a new approach to calculating farm payments for environmental delivery which represents the value the public receives
• larger scale and longer term thinking in delivering environmental schemes
• broadening of the funding base to increase the longer term security of environmental land management measures
• an agri-food supply chain which takes greater ownership for ensuring that environmental standards are achieved