Monthly Digest – March 2025

Dr Dannielle Robb

Apr, 25 2025

Defra Agriculture Budget

Summary of other recent budget announcements (unaffected by SFI):

Increasing payment rates for Higher Level Stewardship – which will apply to all existing agreement holders

Continuing to roll out Higher Tier – which will happen later this year

Re-opening Capital Grants this summer

Making progress on Landscape Recovery

Extending the Farming in Protected Landscapes programme until March 2026 – which is open for applications

Continuing investment in the Farming Innovation Programme (FIP) and the Farming Equipment and Technology Fund (FETF) – with new opportunities to apply for both opening this spring

Expanding the Animal Health and Welfare Pathway – with more funded vet visits now available to farmers.

Farm Business Income Forecast 2024/25

The recent Defra farm business income forecast is live.

Farm Income Rise: Average Farm Business Income (FBI) is forecast to rise in 2024/25 for all farm types except cereals, following a drop in 2023/24 after previous highs.

Lower Input Costs: Reduced costs for fertiliser and feed are key drivers of higher FBI, with strong livestock prices also contributing.

Cereal Farms Decline: Poor weather and lower prices are expected to cut cereal farm FBI by nearly a third to £27,000, though other crops like sugar beet and potatoes will help general cropping farms see a 13% rise to £108,000.

Basic Payment Cuts: The 2024 delinked Basic Payment will drop by 25%, but agri-environment payments are expected to rise by over 75% to £23,000.

IHT implications and updates

In a report released last month, surveying 2,000 British farmers, 4 in 10 British farms could go out of business by 2030 due to IHT changes, the survey reveals.

AHDB’s recommended list for cereals/oilseeds – interactive tool

The Recommended Lists for cereals and oilseeds is now available in an interactive version, here.

Three new fungicides receive UK authorisation

Three new fungicide co-formulations have been approved for use in the UK, which claim to offer key protections against major cereal and OSR diseases.

Maganic; which contains prothioconazole (175 g/l) and difenoconazole (125 g/l) in an emulsifiable concentrate (EC) formulation

Avastel which uses a combination of prothioconazole (150 g/l) and fluxapyroxad (75 g/l)

Maxentis; azoxystrobin (200 g/l) and prothioconazole (150 g/l)

Science and Innovation

Viticulture Advice: Spring Pruning and Tying Techniques

For those expanding into Viticulture, this article highlights some key management techniques for Spring including frost protection, pruning strategies and tying down.

Light intensity linked to optimum post-em performance

The University of Nottingham have carried out a trial to show that light intensity does have a benefit on efficacy of Atlantis Star on Italian ryegrass, rye brome and sterile brome. The trial was carried out in a glasshouse under controlled conditions, so the results shouldn’t be used to predict control in the field, but used to show the relative benefit of brighter conditions on post-em performance.

Hedgerows store 40% more carbon than grasslands

This study by the University of Leeds shows that a consistent increase in soil organic carbon accumulates under hedges, driven by an increase in light particulate organic matter (portion of organic matter in soil that is less dense than mineral particles and has not fully decomposed). It was said to be due to increased leaf and root litter inputs under woody vegetation.

Soil organic carbon samples taken at 10cm intervals in the top 50cm soil, or to bedrock

9 farms, 46 hedges of different age classes

Soil under hedges store on average 40 tonnes more carbon per hectare than managed grassland in all locations. Therefore, hedgerows have a clear benefit to mitigating climate change and improving a farms ability to reach ‘net zero’.

Gene editing vs genetic modification – what’s the difference?

As Defra gave the thumbs up earlier this month to a genetically modified wheat trial run by the University of Oxford, we share an analogy for the difference between gene editing and gene modification.

Imagine your genome (organism DNA) as a newspaper.

Gene editing is like rearranging existing articles—correcting typos, rewording sentences, or shifting paragraphs while keeping all original content.

Gene modification is like cutting an article from a different newspaper and pasting it into yours, introducing entirely new content.

This analogy highlights why gene editing is considered lower risk—you’re only refining what’s already there. Gene modification, on the other hand, can be considered more controversial and unpredictable since it introduces something entirely new, which may have unintended consequences.

Climate change, nature loss and nature-based solutions

This article by the Parliamentary Office Science and Technology summarises in ‘plain English’ the relationship between climate change, nature loss and the potential role of nature-based solutions.