Policy paper

2010 to 2015 government policy: farming industry regulation

Updated 8 May 2015

This was published under the 2010 to 2015 Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition government

This is a copy of a document that stated a policy of the 2010 to 2015 Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition government. The previous URL of this page was https://www.gov.uk/government/policies/simplifying-farming-regulations. Current policies can be found at the GOV.UK policies list.

Issue

Some aspects of a farm and farmer’s work need to be regulated. This is usually because of public or animal health and safety, or to protect the environment.

These rules shouldn’t place an unnecessary burden on the farmer or get in the way of them doing their job. Any regulations should take into account the needs of farmers.

That’s why we’re taking a close look at the rules to see where they can be simplified. We believe a minimal weight of regulations will help create conditions for a strong rural economy.

Actions

Farm inspections

We’re looking at how we can better target and co-ordinate farm inspections. As part of this, where possible, farmers who consistently demonstrate high standards will be inspected less. Read more about how this will work.

Paperwork

We’re planning to reduce the amount of paperwork farmers will have to do.

Livestock movements

We’re looking at how we can make it easier for farmers to move livestock.

Our environment

We’ve helped create the Campaign for the Farmed Environment. This gives farmers reliable advice on what they can do to protect the environment.

Regulation: taking a more consistent approach

We intend to make farming policies more consistent, effective and transparent, and improve our understanding of the farming industry.

Background

The Farming Regulation Task Force published its report in May 2011. It suggested over 200 ways of reducing red tape for farmers.

We published our response to the report in February 2012, saying we would reduce the burden of regulations on farmers and other food processors.

We also established the independent Farming Regulation Task Force Implementation Group in February 2012. The group oversees the work of both government and industry in carrying out the commitments made in response to the task force report. The group published an assessment of progress in February 2013.

In response to the Implementation Group’s assessment, we published an action plan This sets out some actions that we’ll carry out throughout 2013 - and beyond - to reduce red tape for farmers.

Appendix 1: regulation, taking a more consistent approach

This was a supporting detail page of the main policy document.

We’ll make sure our policies are more effective and transparent by:

• bringing in a new policy scrutiny procedure by spring 2013 - this should ensure that we’ve considered all the options for solving a problem, and not just looked at further regulation

• introducing a publicly accessible database in summer 2013 called Defra-Lex - this will contain all our regulations and guidance

• learning more about farming - Defra officials will be visiting farms across the country throughout 2013

Appendix 2: farming and the environment

This was a supporting detail page of the main policy document.

Campaign for the Farmed Environment

We’ve helped create the Campaign for the Farmed Environment (CFE).

The campaign encourages farmers to think about the environment while they’re running their farms.

This kind of ‘voluntary environment management’ can often be good for a farmer’s business. Thinking about the environment can often bring long-term benefits.

‘Voluntary environment management’ could include:

• putting in a skylark plot - a farmer could leave a couple of bare patches in winter crops for skylarks to land and feed in, safe from predators

• leaving a buffer strip down the side of a water course - a farmer could leave a 6 metre wide grass margin alongside a river so that when they spray their crops, the pesticides don’t get into the river

The CFE encourages wildlife and landscape conservation as well as good environmental practices for a profitable farming business.

The next phase of the CFE campaign, involving farming, advisory and conservation organisations, starts in April 2013.

Improving how we work with farmers

Our ‘Review of advice, incentives and partnership approaches’ outlines how we’re going to improve how we work with industry and advisory groups to advise farmers. It was published in March 2013.

Appendix 3: paperwork

This was a supporting detail page of the main policy document.

We’d like farmers to have less paperwork to deal with. We’d also like their paperwork to be simpler. We’ll achieve this by:

• introducing a new IT system for all funding under the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) in England by 2015 - this should make it easier and quicker for a farmer to apply for farm subsidies

• introducing some record-keeping exemptions for certain farms: these will be in the nitrates regulations we’re introducing in May 2013

• using the Smarter Environment Regulation Review to look at the data we collect and asking if we really need to collect it

Appendix 4: farm inspections

This was a supporting detail page of the main policy document.

We want to target our inspections more effectively so that, where possible, we visit farmers who maintain high standards less often. We also want to improve how we co-ordinate and carry out our inspections.

To make this happen, we will:

• improve how different agencies - such as the Rural Payments Agency and the Environment Agency - share information with each other: this will help us to better target our inspections towards higher-risk farms and improve the co-ordination of inspections

• explore the opportunities for implementing earned recognition into on-farm inspections outlined in the Earned Recognition Plan published in August 2013

• make sure that farmers can provide effective feedback on inspections so that we can keep improving the way we work

Appendix 5: livestock movements

This was a supporting detail page of the main policy document.

We’re looking at how we can make the rules on moving livestock simpler and also reduce the amount of reporting farmers have to do.

We want to have the same requirements for all livestock. This means people who farm more than 1 type of livestock will be able to follow a single set of rules. This will reduce the number of movements that many farmers have to report.

We’ll also be looking at the costs and benefits of some other proposals to make reporting animal movement more straightforward.

We’ll introduce an electronic system of reporting movements for sheep and goats by the end of 2014. There’s already a similar system in place for monitoring the movement of pigs.

The new system will make it easier to report movements. It’s also an opportunity to take advantage of the introduction of electronic identification for sheep.