The main barriers to agroecological
farming becoming more prevalent
This
section draws on two years of farmer-led participatory action research which
entailed consultations and interviews with wide ranging stakeholders and
extended deliberative processes to examine the main barriers to agroecology
being more widely practiced in the UK.
These barriers include access to land, access to capital, knowledge and
skills, and supportive markets. These
are discussed in turn. It is important
to stress that all these obstacles
need to be addressed for agroecology to successfully spread in this
country. For example, creating markets or
offering capital without also providing for land or developing skills will not
address the current problems in our food and farming systems.
Access
to land has been cited as the top barrier for aspiring new entrant agroecological
farmers in the UK, far above concerns about profitability of farming.[40],[28]
As the population of farmers declines rapidly in the UK, supporting new
entrants needs to be a priority. Access
to land for agroecological farming includes four key issues: availability, appropriateness,
affordability and accommodation.
Availability: Farmland ownership and control in the UK is
highly concentrated, and relatively little land is available on the market for
new entrants. The total land in the UK
utilised for agriculture is 17.36 million hectares (representing 71% of all
land in the UK), and it is owned or managed by some 290,000 farmers, business
partners, directors and spouses, which represents just 0.44% of the population.[1]
Further,
investments in land as a commodity (land speculation) is another factor keeping
land out of access for many (and also taking land out of agricultural
use). Other freehold parcels of land are
often purchased by people wishing to keep horses and others who are not engaged
in productive farming, or by developers wishing to bank the land in pursuit of
eventual ‘planning gain’.
Defra’s
proposed phasing out of area-based payments in itself may not necessarily
increase the availability of land for agroecological producers., While some
land owners might be incentivised to downsize, making more land available,
there is a risk is that this land will be purchased by land speculators, and/or
added to already-large-farms. Policies
which give preference to agroecological producers when land goes on the market could
help to address this risk. Defra should
also coordinate with other UK Government departments to curb land speculation
if it is serious about ensuring that land becomes available for new ecological
farmers.
County
Farms could be one way in which new entrant agroecological farmers could get
better access land, at least while starting out. The County Farm network is being depleted, as
farm estates are being sold off by many councils. From their peak in 1938, the area of county
farms has declined by 40 percent, and the number of holdings—and by extension
the number of farmers supported by these schemes—has declined from
approximately 32,000 holdings to less than 5,000.[41] However, some councils, such as
Norfolk, Suffolk and Pembrokeshire, have recently reinvested in their county
farm estates in an effort to explicitly support new rural enterprises, local
food systems and also provide affordable housing for farmer tenants. Defra has indicated that it will ‘consider
how to help Local Authorities who want to invest in their Council Farms’. A move which is welcome. This support to Local Authorities should
include specific support for agroecological farming.
Appropriateness:
Land that is appropriate for
agroecological farmers, and particularly new entrants, must include
considerations of size, location and amenities.
Such farmers tend to need land in parcels that range from approximately
0.5 hectare to 50 hectares. This is a
broad range without hard boundaries, but generally agroecologists are not in
the market for several hundred or thousand hectares of farmland. Farmland which is located near to towns or
cities is important both for access to markets as well as for social networks,
which can be important for young farmers.[42]
In terms of amenities, agroecological farmers need adequate road access
and typically access to water.
Affordability: Commodification of land has resulted in its
treatment as an investment vehicle, rather than a common asset to be used in
the public interest, including the production of food and regeneration of
ecosystems. Farmland prices in
England have increased by 400% over the past twenty years.[43] Even accounting for general inflation, this
rise in prices has been higher than that of equities and of London residential
property. While the removal of area-based payments could help to
reduce this high rate of inflation, CAP payments are not the only factor which
affects land prices. Land speculation
and investment and general pressure for development have significant impacts on
land availability, increasing prices. In
France, the state ties farmland lease prices to agricultural prices, and limits
the amount of profit that landlords can make off of renting out land.[44]
Defra could learn from
this model to reorient land prices toward farming incomes.
Accommodation
and other buildings: The National Planning Policy Framework is
supposed to preserve the availability of agricultural land through its
separation between agricultural, woodland and development land. However, this distinction makes it difficult
for farmers to obtain planning permission to live onsite, and particularly
agroecological farmers who are producing at smaller scales and using more
hands-on approaches to their conventional neighbours. The difficulty of living onsite is
problematic for agroecological farmers, as they often require frequent contact
with the land, which is most feasible – economically and in terms of time –
when living on site. In addition, new
farm businesses often do not generate enough income to secure a mortgage on a
home nearby. While some farmers do
succeed in attaining planning permission at appeal, this process is costly for
both applicants and the government.[45]
Similar
challenges are faced by agroecological farmers when they apply for permission
to erect polytunnels, sheds or other structures necessary for their farm
businesses. Opposition often comes from
a NIMBY (not in my back yard) approach of the neighbours who do not want
‘plastic tat’ in their countryside, despite consuming many products grown under
plastic in Spain and other countries. It
also comes from nearby farmers who have a hard time believing that anyone could
make a living from a small piece of land – in effect, grouping legitimate
agroecological producers with hobbyist farmers and those practicing
‘horsiculture’.[2] More could be done to educate planning
officials and also farmers about agroecological production and how to distinguish
it from hobby farming, and sensitise the general public about the importance of
domestic food production.
Land
Cooperatives such as the Ecological Land Cooperative[3] have
experience in identifying suitable farmland for agroecological producers and also
equipping it with essentials such as water access. They provide support to farmers ranging from
farming techniques to marketing to connecting to other farmers through their
networks. However, these cooperatives
are limited by inflated farmland prices.
Support for these cooperatives could enable them to expand the number of
farmers they support.
Ability
to invest and security of rights: For
farmers, secure right to remain on farmland is a huge factor. Agroecological production entails high levels
of investment in the land (soils, perennial plants, hedges, trees and
infrastructure) as well as in relationships with local consumers in the case of
local and more direct markets. The
Health & Harmony policy statement indicated that Defra would revise agricultural
tenancy laws. For any revisions, England
could learn from other countries, including Scotland and France, about different
models for secure tenancies. In the
crofting areas of Scotland, tenure is secure for smallholders, rents are
regulated and crofters receive compensation for improvements. While they have
the right to buy their crofts if they wished, many producers opt out of buying the
land they farm because there is little advantage in the context of these
provisions for security. Similarly, in
France, tenancies are for a minimum of 9 years and automatically renew. Frensh farmland rental prices are tied to
agricultural commodity prices, limiting the profit of non-farming land owners
while ensuring farmland is affordable for farmers.[46]
Without
appropriate checks, long tenancies could enable poor practices to continue
uncontested. For example, tenancies
under the Agricultural Holdings Act can prevent landlords (including councils)
from intervening in the farming practices of tenants until the tenancy runs
through several generations.[4] However, existing models in the UK are
demonstrating ways this can be overcome.
In Scotland, oversight from the Crofting Commission for appropriate
upkeep of crofts ensures some degree of accountability while still providing
the security of long tenures.
|
While
access to land is a complex issue that goes beyond the immediate scope of Defra,
there are actionable strategies that should be supported through Defra policy
to ensure that the price and availability of farmland supports agroecological
farming.
·
Defra must not assume that phasing out area-based subsidy
payments will solve the problem of high land prices and low land
availability. To address these
pressing problems, Defra needs to collaborate with other Government
departments to address land speculation.
Without addressing land speculation, removing area-based direct
payments is unlikely to sufficiently increase the availability of land to new
entrants or reduce land prices.
·
To support agroecological farming, Defra needs to put in
place measures to limit farmland consolidation, particularly when farming
practices are unsustainable and do not contribute to healthy food
production.
·
Defra should support planning authorities to recognise and
differentiate agroecological holdings from ‘hobby farms’ and horsiculture,
acknowledging that certain buildings, be they homes, barns or polytunnels,
are essential to enabling the next generation of farmers to produce on the
land in sustainable and economically viable ways. This could happen within the existing
National Planning Policy Framework’s clause for planning permission when
there is ‘essential need’, which agroecological farmers often demonstrate.
The proposed collaboration with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and
Local Government mentioned in Health and Harmony is also an opportunity to
ensure that new entrants have access to housing.
·
The government should actively support Local Authorities
to retain – and possibly even extend – their farm estates. This has been mentioned in DEFRA’s recent
policy statement[47] and in
the Health and Harmony consultation
paper [1] and is
a welcome approach. However, to ensure
county farms specifically support agroecology, counties should provide
support and/or incentives to existing tenants to convert to more
agroecological approaches. Councils should also explicitly recruit farmers
who wish to practice agroecology and make appropriate tenancies available to
new entrants rather than consolidating farmland into existing tenancies.[5]
·
Defra should provide support for existing land
cooperatives, which have experience in recruiting, supporting and managing
agroecological tenants could also help expand the number of farmers they
support.
·
Defra’s consideration of reforming agricultural tenancy
laws could be positive for agroecological farming, particularly if it is done
in a way that encourages new entrants, rather than enabling the investment in
land as a commodity by non-farming capitalists. Defra should examine other countries’
models for agriculture tenancy laws and should also ensure that
agroecological farmers are represented in decision making on this reform.
·
Lastly, a farm land registry should be established to
register interest in taking on farmland.
Similar to the self-build registry, this would enable the government
and particularly local authorities, to better account for the demand for
farmland – including different sizes and types of land parcels – in planning
decisions.
|
Aside
from the obvious barriers caused by the high price or rental costs of land, there
is also the cost of investment in infrastructure and machinery. Such infrastructure could range from
polytunnels to farm tools to small tractors, packing sheds and milk processing
equipment.
Defra’s
Countryside Productivity Small Grant scheme offers smaller amounts, of £3,000
to £12,000, but grants only cover 40% of costs.
This means that less expensive items would have been ineligible, and
also that securing match funding for larger items was out of reach for many
farmers. England’s Young Farmers’ Scheme
added 25% to the area-based payments that would be received by farmers under 40
years of age. However, given that many
agroecological holdings are under or near the limit for basic payments, this
scheme would have excluded many young agroecological farmers.
England
could learn from Scotland’s popular support schemes for new entrants and young
farmers. The £14 million earmarked was
spent long before the projected end of the scheme as demand outstripped supply.[48]
Ways Forward
Defra
could improve its support for young farmers, new entrants and could also
introduce a scheme explicitly for agroecological farmers. This could happen through allowing farmers
to apply for smaller grants where necessary, removing the match funding
requirement, and allowing funds to be spent on the costs deemed necessary by
the farmers (subject to business plans, etc.).
Such
a scheme could be modelled on Scotland’s New Entrants and Young Farmers
Start-Up schemes, which provide grants of £15k - £70k. Money can be used for the purchase of land,
infrastructure, or cover other start-up costs. The New Entrants Capital Grant Scheme
couples grants for people new to farming with consultancy advice and
mentoring from experienced farmers.[48]
|
While
some agroecological techniques have been traditionally used in Britain, such as
the rotation of animals and crops and the use of windbreaks, the majority of
existing conventional farmers and aspiring agroecological farmers are
potentially unaware of many useful agroecological approaches such as
polyculture for a diversity of crops, push-pull techniques for pest management,
soil fertility building through biofertilisers and green manures and more.[49]
While Health and Harmony and
the September 2018 Policy Statement heavily emphasized the need for technology,
a high-tech approach is unlikely to support agroecology. Developing skills and knowledge of farmers is
paramount to producing food in ecologically sound ways. Agroecology is highly knowledge intensive,
both in terms of the broad range of practices, but also in terms of the
location-specific knowledge required to practice agroecology effectively. Support for ongoing knowledge
development—particularly related to agroecological approaches—needs to be
emphasized as much as or more than investment in the latest tools and
technologies.[50]
Training
opportunities in agroecology do exist, but overall there is a need for more
training courses to supply the knowledge and skills required to operate an
agroecological holding. Most formal
agroecological trainings occur outside of mainstream agricultural and
horticultural colleges.
If
considering organic trainings as agroecological, then trainings include those
provided by the Soil Association, Biodynamic Agricultural College, School Farm
CSA, Schumacher College and Garden Organic.
Scotland’s Rural College is the only mainstream college which provides
an organic farming MSC and other trainings to the authors’ knowledge. Shorter trainings include those offered by
the Kindling Trust (a 4-day commercial grower course), the Agroecology Land
Trust, Bridgewater college (Level 5); an Organic Gardening Course at the
Horticulture Correspondence College.
The
Soil Association runs a ‘Future Growers Scheme’. While this was previously a 2-year paid
apprenticeship with mentoring from the employing farm, it has unfortunately
been reduced to a series of 6 weekend courses and farm visits with fees upward
of £1,500. This significant change is
largely due to a continuing problem with finding host farms that can afford to
pay apprentices year round.
There
are several informal traineeships run by existing farmers and growers, which
provide on farm education, and experience.
These schemes are generally very positive in outcome, but more formal training
that include classroom-based learning could enhance student learning. The LWA is currently investigating expanding
and enhancing the present system of informal traineeships with additional peer
to peer learning, farm walks and better information sharing between farmers,
and trainees.
It
is essential that Defra supports existing ‘conventional’ farmers to engage with
agroecological practices to accelerate improvements to farming practices. Many conventional farmers are unaware of ways
in which they could reorient their farms to better integrate food production
and ecology. Initiatives implemented by
Natural England to support farmers to reduce nitrate usage and improve wildflower
margins are a great start but much more is needed. Further support could be offered to enable
farmers to reduce pesticide use, introduce polycultures, regularly use cover
crops and integrate livestock and crops where appropriate.
DEFRA’s
Health and Harmony consultation paper
states: “Making sure that our agriculture, horticulture, forestry and food
supply chain industries have access to sufficient and suitably-skilled labour
is essential to industry growth and competitiveness. We will take the
opportunity to stimulate a forward-thinking agricultural industry that invests
in the future through innovative practice and automation.” (p10). It is
essential to recognise that the innovations needed are not necessarily
high-tech. Defra needs to support the
innovative agroecological skills that are already being developed: skills
mentioned above which make farming enjoyable and rewarding to the next
generation of farmers, as demonstrated by recent research.[28]
Unfortunately, in its section about ‘a skilled workforce’ the Policy
Statement only referred to plans to allow in migrant seasonal workers, leaving
questions about whether and how it might improve the skills of its existing
farmers.
Ways forward
·
Defra should encourage existing agricultural and
horticultural colleges and universities to incorporate agroecological
training into their curricula.
·
Defra should provide support for bursaries and
scholarships for new entrants wishing to undertake a course related to
agroecology. This would help support
the spread of agroecological practices and also demonstrate a governmental
commitment to this promising approach to farming.
·
Defra should also support existing farmers to incorporate
more agroecological practices into their farming. Offering training but also on-farm support
(e.g. building on that provided by Natural England) is essential to protect
the remainder of Britain’s wildlife and soils.
|
The
structure of mainstream food markets is largely prohibitive for agroecological
production. High levels of consolidation
in trade, processing and retail, as well as a just-in-time supply chains demand
high volumes, high uniformity and high flexibility, while reducing the value
received by producers.[51]
These structural barriers to agroecology need to be tackled through, for
example, strengthened regulation to break down oligopolies and other regulatory
mechanisms, at both national and global levels.
Parallel to this, markets which support agroecological production can be
encouraged at local and national levels, as described in this section.
Given
that agroecological farms tend to be smaller, there are inevitably issues
around economies of scale. Logistics (including transport) and market access
(e.g. insufficient quantities to sell to certain purchasers) can make certain
markets – including those of large retailers and public procurement
schemes—inaccessible, particularly in the absence of cooperative-like
structures that enable producers to aggregate their goods, processing and/or
transport.
Prices
received for products are an issue for all farmers, who receive a small
percentage of what consumers pay for food items. According to Defra 2017 statistics,
total consumer expenditure on food, drink and catering services in the UK was
£220bn.[35] The total income from farming was only £5.74
billion,[52]
of which £3.7bn came from subsidies.[35] Thus it appears only 1% of consumer spending
went towards farmer incomes in Britain.
Agroecological
farmers have to compete with cheap food, sold at prices which do not reflect
the true cost of this foods
production, which are otherwise paid for through taxes (e.g. to address
obesity, flooding, water pollution, etc.).[22] Prices are largely dictated by large-scale
traders (e.g. Cargill), processors and retailers [53], and consumers’ perceptions of a
reasonable price for fresh produce are influenced by the prices that consumers
see in the supermarket.
The
Health and Harmony White Paper
states, “…we will adopt a trade approach which promotes industry innovation and
lower prices for consumers.” While it is
essential that food is affordable, it is questionable as to whether lower
prices are needed or even feasible without further ecological degradation at
home and/or abroad. It is important that
Defra does not champion cheap food instead of affordable food. ‘Cheap food fundamentally tends to reify
social inequalities, rather than addressing food poverty’.[54]
Cheap food also tends to disregard (or externalise) environmental
impacts of production, meaning it is not a viable approach in the long term.
Rather
than reducing costs at the farmgate, shortened supply chains can help ensure
that a reasonable monetary return can be made from the agroecologist’s labours.
It is working through these shorter
supply chains that most agroecological farmers make a living. A number of ‘alternative’ marketing models,
and food distribution networks webs which are operating successfully at present
using the short supply chain model.
These tend to be based on relatively local markets, with ‘local’ being
defined differently by different actors and varying across different
foods. Four models, community interest
intermediaries, public procurement, cooperatives and community supported
agriculture (CSA) are presented below.
a.
Community
Interest Intermediaries
Most of the retail value of food is currently captured by
intermediaries, rather than accruing to farmers. Farmers markets and veg box schemes developed
in part as a response to this as they offer a way for farmers to retain most of
the retail value of their foods.
However, not all farmers have the capabilities, resources or desire to
sell directly. Community-interest
intermediaries can play a role in these situations. Tamar Grow Local[6]
(TGL) is a not-for-profit Community Interest Company in Plymouth. With a low mark-up of 18% between the
producers and consumers, TGL offers producers fair prices based on the cost of
production, rather than global market prices; which have been, at times, up to 150-275%
higher than average farm gate prices.[55] TGL also creates new marketing outlets for
producers through shared label schemes and processing units. TGL’s ‘Grow Share
Cook’ scheme procures vegetables from local farmers and distributes them to
people living in food poverty. The
programme has achieved a healthier diet for 85% of participants.[55]
TGL provides support to 60 producers, has reached 200 low
income households and even more general consumers. With a required external support of £40k per
year from donors, Tamar Grow Local is economically efficient in its support to
producers while also generating important social and health outcomes for
Plymouth’s population.[56] Without support, however, it is possible that
such successful models would have to scale back or shut down.
b.
Public
Procurement
Public procurement offers potential to create steady and
reliable markets for farms and to support farmers to produce sustainably, while
also providing access to healthy foods for the public, including people
experiencing food poverty or other challenges.
The UK public sector spends £2.4 billion annually procuring food and
catering services.[57]
‘Sustainable Public Procurement’ (SPP) has the potential to
address environmental and social concerns.[58] Such procurement is well within the remit of
current EU (and WTO) regulations: Article 67 in Directive 2014/24/EU allows for
Sustainable Public Procurement, in that the ‘most economically advantageous
tender’ can allow for not only cost but also ‘delivery conditions such as
delivery date, delivery process and delivery process…The weighting of the award
criteria further allows for achieving the best combination of price and
quality’.[59] This was established in the Helsinki case
C-513/1999, in which the European Court of Justice ruled that contracting
authorities can take into consideration ‘production methods’ of suppliers as
well.[59]
Within Europe, many local and regional authorities, have
altered their tendering procedures to source from small and medium sized
producers who are based in their locality and/or producing using ecological
approaches. Examples include the school
sectors in Malmo (Sweden), Rome (Italy), Lens (France), Munich (Germany), and
Bath (UK); as well as municipalities of Zagreb (Croatia), Tukums (Latvia), and
Podravje (Slovenia).[58] However, one of the best examples of public
procurement which supports ecology and family farms is that of Brazil.
Brazil’s school feeding and public procurement programmes
operate at national scales and are run through local municipalities. They explicitly aim to benefit both food
producers and consumers, particularly small-scale farms and consumers who are
living with food and nutritional insecurity.
To achieve this, food is procured using a simplified and
smallholder-friendly procurement model which has substituted the traditional
bidding procedure’, thirty percent of funding for school meals must be used to
source food from family farms in the municipality, and agroecological and
organic farms (certified through a Participatory Guarantee System) are given a
price premium and preferential access to contracts.[60]
While Defra commissioned A
Plan for Public Procurement in 2014, its recommendations rely on voluntary
action by caterers and procurers and does not include provision to ensure
contracts do not only go to large scale suppliers.[57]
The UK could learn from Brazil and other countries to leverage the
potential of Britain’s public procurement.
c.
Cooperatives
As
noted in the Health and Harmony White Paper, cooperatives are ‘a powerful way
for farmers to benefit from economies of scale and lower the costs of buying
inputs or hiring services such as storage and transport. Agricultural cooperatives also enable farmers
to access new markets and reduce risks.’ (p57)
Supporting
more producer cooperatives, through making grants and technical support
available, could help address the aggregation and economies of scale problem
faced by many agroecological producers.
While
the September policy statement and Health and Harmony paper mention
improvements in the collection and sharing of data and information for
increased transparency and communication, it is unlikely that this will, in itself,
change the structure of supply chains so that farmers can earn a living wage
while covering the costs of sustainable production. While conventional farmers receive a very
small percentage of the retail price of food in mainstream supply chains, models
such as Tamar Grow Local, demonstrate that it does not need to be that way.
d.
Community
Supported Agriculture (CSA)
Another
model is that of Community Supported Agriculture (CSA), in which people
subscribe or become a member of a farm scheme, making a direct linkage between
producers and consumers. In some
schemes, consumers share a degree of risk, for example, accepting that they may
receive less food from the scheme if a harvest fails, while nonetheless paying
their monthly or annual share. CSAs can
also involve members working on the farm for a certain amount of time to
contribute to the production. CSAs may
be arranged by individual farmers or through collective groupings of
farmers.
CSAs
can provide consumers with a high variety of foods. Quality is guaranteed partly through the
ability for members to come to the farm and witness production processes, and
partly through the accountability that comes with a direct connection with the
producers. ‘Rather than a distant,
anonymous production of food grown with chemical inputs certified ‘safe’ by a
government bureaucracy, CSA members not only know where and when their food is
grown, they know who grows it.’[61]
CSAs also reduce distance between producer and consumer, leading to less
environmental impacts from transport.
The
two main reasons why people become members of a CSA is to access quality food
and/or affordable food.[62]
A study of CSAs in the UK found that, ‘Although CSA members are more
likely to enjoy middle class incomes, all income brackets are represented: 12%
of members have annual household income under £15,000. For 37% of initiatives, providing a service
for those at risk of social exclusion is a high or medium priority aim. A handful of initiatives offer discounts to
the low waged or accept Healthy Start vouchers, though more are planning to do
so and several offer free or discounted shares in return for work.’ (p30)
CSAs
can offer an entry into farming for those who do not want to follow a
‘conventional’ approach or who find the status quo inaccessible, and has been
demonstrated to create employment in agriculture: an average of 2.6 full time
equivalent employees per initiative (Ibid, p31)
At
present, there are approximately 100 CSAs in the UK, serving an average of 40
households each.[63]
While this is not insignificant, there is certainly scope for its
expansion in Britain.
Ways forward:
Community-interest intermediaries, sustainable public procurement,
cooperatives and community supported agriculture schemes can increase the
value of food retained by producers while also ensuring accessibility
(including affordability) for all consumers.
These models can also improve transparency in supply chains.
·
Defra should allocate explicit support, e.g.
through future iterations of Rural Development Schemes, to facilitate the
spreading of innovative local models that benefit both producers and
consumers, such as iterations of Tamar Grow Local or local CSA schemes. This might include funding for start-up
costs (trainings, market research, etc.), and support for operational costs.
·
Public procurement should source, at least
partially, from local agroecological farms to encourage and support this type
of farming. There is scope for the UK
to build on existing efforts to ensure publicly procured food delivers more
public benefits for both producers and consumers. The UK could learn from Brazil and go
beyond voluntary recommendations to require a percentage of publicly procured
food to be sourced from agroecological production.
·
Defra should support the formation of new cooperatives and
strengthen existing ones through offering bursaries for cooperative leaders
to participate in trainings and offering start-up grants for the initial
stages of cooperative building, as considerable investment of time is needed
to recruit members and establish decision making structures.
|
[1]
Based on Defra 2016 data, available from https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/616865/AUK-Chapter2-01jun17.ods. We are indebted to Robin Grey for these
calculations.
[2]
‘Horsiculture’ is a colloquial term for those using agricultural land for
horses.
[4]
The inability to influence farming practices due to AHA tenancies was
referenced in a study of the Brighton & Hove Council’s Farmland
Estate. See Wach and Ely 2018 for more
details.
[5]
For example, recently in Brighton & Hove, when a council farm tenancy was
ending with a retirement, the city council allocated the farm (approximately
200 acres) to an existing tenant farmer, enlarging his estate. In contrast, other councils have downsized
existing tenancies to create more entry-level holdings.
[6]
See http://www.tamargrowlocal.org/
for more information about Tamar Grow Local and the Grow Share Cook scheme
Part four to be found here ...
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