The GWCT’s Allerton Project demonstration farm has joined the Central England branch of the Environmental Farmers Group.
The pioneering farmer-led environmental cooperative provides natural capital investors with a single point of contact and aims to ensure that farmers receive fair reward for delivering nature recovery and climate change mitigation on a landscape scale. EFG has already has brought forward eight natural capital projects with a forecast value in excess of £34m and is managing 20 live trading leads.
Dr Johnny Wake is Chairman of EFG Central England and managing partner of Courteenhall Farms in Northamptonshire. He said,
“We are delighted that the Allerton Project has become a full member of Central England EFG. To have a nationally and internationally renowned entity join us is a vote of confidence and can only help us attract the right sort of attention to what we are doing. The work of the Allerton Project, by its focus on conservation and environment, and also its efforts to share learning, is a very natural fit with EFG. We look forward to working with the team there.”
Central England promises to have the largest geographical spread of all the EFG cells with the potential to cover 710,000 hectares including catchments in Northamptonshire, Leicestershire, Rutland, Lincolnshire, Cambridgeshire, Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire. By blending public and private finance it will help farmers fill the future funding gap, with £125m due to be lost annually from BPS payments in the Central England area alone.
Dr Alastair Leake, director of the Allerton Project, said: “The EFG is a fantastic mechanism by which we can disseminate the wide range of evidence-based environmental measures we have developed over the past 30 years. Our research on water-friendly farming will be of particular relevance as the Central England region feeds many of the UK’s biggest river catchments. It is also a natural progression for our local farmer cluster to join the wider cooperative connecting neighbouring farms over a huge area.”
The cooperative’s structure of equalization cells ensures all their members benefit financially from any trade done by the group. The cells are made up of clusters of neighbouring farmers, which offers investors greater value through interconnected catchment-scale projects that can be measured and monitored. Natural Capital Advisory (NCA), a subsidiary of the Game & Wildlife Conservation Trust (GWCT), will broker all trades on behalf of EFG and provide its environmental auditing service, guaranteeing a high level of assurance to both farmers and investors.
Central England EFG will develop its own unique geographical and cultural identity. Given the group’s proximity to large industrial urban areas there is great potential for farmers to play a key role in delivering statuary and voluntary environmental offsets.
Johnny Wake continued, “We are delighted that so many farmers within the Central England area have registered Expressions of Interest in joining EFG and are joining as full members. We look forward to welcoming more full members. By joining they gain access to the highest quality, cutting edge science-backed advice on transitioning to regenerative agriculture provided by the Allerton Project and the opportunity to take advantage of large-scale natural capital trades.”