Environmental groups have called on the new Labour government to 'significantly' boost the agricultural budget in order to meet nature and climate targets.
RSPB, National Trust and the Wildlife Trusts have concluded that increasing investment in nature-friendly farming to £5.9bn per annum across the UK was 'essential' to meet the targets.
As well as environmental goals, the three charities said this would "improve the resilience" of the UK farming industry.
According to them, investing in nature restoration was a "necessary, long-term strategy" that would help to future proof UK farming, while also mitigating against climate change.
The current annual agricultural budget is £3.5 billion – which remains unchanged since 2013 – and approximately 20-25% is currently spent on agri-environment schemes.
The charities have also insisted that environmental schemes must be delivered at "sufficient scale to meet the challenges ahead".
Furthermore, they said that that for every pound of public money spent on nature restoration, the return would be at least three times that investment.
The three organisations said: “Climate change and nature loss are the two biggest threats to UK food security and we are already seeing their impacts on food production, including the impact of the incredibly wet year to date.
"We are urging the new UK government and devolved governments to urgently rise to this challenge with more ambitious funding models for nature-friendly farming.
"Farmers must be rewarded for helping nature to recover and tackling climate change, as well as producing food. These issues are deeply interlinked."
Across the UK, farmers are already experiencing the worsening impacts of changing weather patterns, with drought and flooding impacting food production.
But Martin Lines, CEO of the Nature Friendly Farming Network (NFFN), said the groups' new ask should be a wake-up call for decision-makers across the UK.
He said: "We have already seen the impact a wet winter and widespread flooding has had this year, and we know we can expect much more weather-related volatility in the future.
"As the new government starts work, we need to see increased ambition for the farming budget and rapid scheme progress so the farming community can swiftly transition to nature-friendly farming at the scale required.”
While increased public funding is seen as important, the groups said more also needed to be done to unlock private investment in environmentally friendly farming.
