Private investment in ecosystem services has more potential to reduce on-farm emissions than the government's schemes, a project has found.
The Resilient Dairy Landscapes project explored the trade-offs between farmers’ livelihoods, the natural environment and a stable supply of reasonably priced dairy products.
It evaluated the operation of Landscape Enterprise Networks (LENs), which match private investors affected by landscape challenges with land managers.
The £1.5m project, undertaken by Scotland’s Rural College (SRUC) and funded by the Global Food Security programme, explored LENs in Cumbria and East Anglia.
It also initiated the first networks in South West Scotland and supported their extension into Europe.
It found that farmers in the Eden Valley, Cumbria planted hedgerows four times faster under the privately funded Nestle-First Milk scheme than in public agri-environment schemes.
According to the project's researchers, this suggested that private sector investment may be needed to reach the UK's ambitious net-zero targets.
Farmers interviewed said they preferred private investment via LENs, which offer a simplified evaluation process, to publicly funded agri-environment alternatives.
The project also sought to understand if the implementation of on-farm interventions under the Cumbrian scheme affected the prevalence and incidence of vector borne diseases in grazing cattle.
The study found there was no impact from planting more hedgerows on vector-borne diseases such as summer mastitis.
Lead researcher Mark Reed, at SRUC, said the findings were important because they showed the important role hedgerow planting could play in meeting net zero targets.
He said the research also showed how carbon finance could speed this process up and make hedgerow planting more attractive to farmers.
“LENs are now a proven method for enabling companies to invest in the natural capital they depend upon," Mr Reed explained.
"The research shows that if designed well, privately funded schemes can be more attractive to farmers than publicly funded agri-environment schemes, because they are more flexible.”
The project is being carried out in partnership with the universities of Newcastle, Leeds and Liverpool, and Nestle UK among others.
