The Scottish Government has set ambitious targets for future woodland expansion to cover 21% of Scotland by 2032. There is concern that the current Forestry Grant Scheme (FGS) and agri-environment schemes are not sufficiently attractive to farmers to result in significant uptake of on-farm tree planting. Furthermore, farmers and crofters are concerned about productive land being taken out of agricultural production in Scotland and being bought by private investors looking to offset carbon emissions in their own industries.
Cumulus Consultants, with Lockett Agri-Environmental, was asked by the Soil Association Scotland (a long-standing Cumulus Client) and the Woodland Trust Scotland to provide recommendations to the Scottish Government to encourage small-scale planting of (native) trees on farms. The focus of this project was primarily on approaches to integrate trees on farms that fall outside the scope of the existing FGS (i.e. not farm woodlands or regular shelterbelts). The recommendations were shared with the government at the 2024 Royal Highland Show.
The Challenge
There are many ways trees can be integrated on farms. The challenge is to create a scheme or set of options that:
- Is attractive to farmers; i.e. easy to understand, complements their business, and fits with their farming operations.
- Sufficiently compensates farmers for their costs, i.e. costs of trees, tree protection/fencing, labour, income foregone.
- Provides ‘Value for money’ for the Scottish Government, i.e. paying a fair rate to encourage uptake, but not pay more than necessary (to avoid so-called ‘dead weight’ loss).
- Encourages greater uptake of tree and agroforestry options by farmers to deliver more trees on farms.
Insight and outcomes
We focused on identifying tree planting systems and options that would most likely be taken up by farmers and be most beneficial in terms of supporting farm businesses as well as nature and climate. Options were identified from the literature review, and a long list was whittled down through an online workshop and interviews with relevant stakeholders with practical experience of planting trees on farm land.
The outputs of this work included:
- A set of six options that farmers would easily recognise, including a specification and costings.
- An assessment of opportunities for integrating these options into the new Scottish agri-environment and grant schemes,
- Recommendations for payment rates and structures, and metrics and targets for reporting.
- An estimate of the total cost of such an agroforestry scheme for the Government.
“We were delighted with the outcome of the project, and the standard/rigour of work – both during the process and in the final submitted report. This team has a wealth of experience, is proactive, easy to work with and delivers a very high standard of reporting that fits with the requirements of government and other public agencies that we are trying to influence.”
David McKay, Soil Association Scotland