Guidance

Piloting the Sustainable Farming Incentive: making an application

Updated 10 September 2021

This guidance was withdrawn on 7 October 2021

This page has been withdrawn because it’s out of date. For current information read: Sustainable Farming Incentive pilot guidance.

Applies to England

This page is part of the guidance for the Sustainable Farming Incentive pilot. It explains how to make an application and covers:

• how to make sure your details on the Rural Payments service are up to date
• choosing standards and ambition levels
• making an application
• making changes to an application
• what happens when you’re offered an agreement

The deadline for applications is 30 September 2021.

Make notes as you apply

Defra wants to learn from your experiences with the pilot version of the Sustainable Farming Incentive Scheme in order to make improvements.

As you apply, make notes on:

• guidance pages, including this one – is the information clear enough and is anything missing?
• your experience of choosing standards and ambition levels, making an application and entering into a pilot agreement

We’ll ask you to fill in a short feedback survey after you submit your application, and we’ll gather further feedback when pilot agreements begin from November 2021.

Make sure your Rural Payments service details are up to date

You’ll make your pilot application online through the Rural Payments service.

Before you make your application, you must make sure that all the information about you, your business and your land on the Rural Payments service is up to date.

It will be used to make your agreement and calculate payments.

Check and update your personal and business details

Sign in to the Rural Payments service and check your personal details, business details and permissions.

To submit your SFI pilot application, you’ll need Environmental Land Management ‘Submit’ permission. The default position for Environmental Land Management permissions is ‘View’. Only someone with ‘Business Details: Full’ permission will be able to change the permissions. You can also give someone else permission to submit the application on your behalf.

The pilot uses the same process as Countryside Stewardship to update Rural Payments service details. You can check the following Countryside Stewardship guidance if you need help:

• signing in
• updating your personal or business details or your permission levels

Check and update your maps

When you apply to the pilot, you’ll choose from the land parcels linked to your Single Business Identifier (SBI).

View your maps to make sure they show the correct:

• land parcels
• permanent land parcel boundaries
• land cover

If you need to update your land parcel information

Use the RLE1 form to update permanent land parcel boundaries or land cover, or register land.

If you need to add land parcels

Use the add land by email service to add a registered land parcel to your SBI.

Put ‘SFI pilot add land’ as the subject of your email.

You must send the email at least 2 weeks before you apply.

Wait for the land to be added before you continue with your application. This should take around 5 working days.

Get a report about historic and archaeological features

You must download a Sustainable Farm Incentive Historic Environment Farm Environment Record (SFI HEFER) before you make your application.

This will tell you about any historic and archaeological features on your land. It will also tell you how they affect the actions you can take under the standards. For example, you must not plant trees on historic sites.

You’ll need your SBI to use the service.

Get an SFI HEFER report for your land.

If any of the actions you take as part of your agreement will affect a scheduled monument, you’ll need written consent from the Secretary of State for Culture Media and Sport. Read the guidance about protecting scheduled monuments.

Plan how you’ll apply the standards

If you’ve chosen to use one of the standards, then the actions in that standard, at the ambition level you’ve chosen, are mandatory. You must do them as part of your agreement.

All the standards have links to advice on how to complete the actions in that standard. You do not have to follow this advice.

These are indicative standards and payment rates while work continues to refine our assessments and receive feedback from farmers and stakeholders. We will publish final versions of these standards by November 2021.

1. Check the standards

There are currently 8 standards:

• arable and horticultural land
• arable and horticultural soils - updated in June 2021
• farm woodland
• hedgerows
• improved grassland
• improved grassland soils - updated in June 2021
• low and no input grassland
• water body buffering

You must choose an ambition level. There are 3 levels for most standards:

• introductory
• intermediate
• advanced

The farm woodland standard only has one level.

Capital items

We’ve updated the list of capital items that will be available to help you meet the actions of each standard. Eligible capital items are listed in the individual standards guidance.

Pilot participants will be able to apply for these through the Countryside Stewardship Capital Grants scheme from early 2022.

2. Decide which land parcels you are going to include

Decide which of your land parcels you are going to include in the application and which standards are appropriate for them.

You must have management control of the land included in your agreement so you can fulfil the actions in the standards on the land whilst under agreement. For the pilot, this means:

• owner occupier, farming the land yourself or employing a contractor; or
• tenant with a Farm Business Tenancy (FBT) under the Agricultural Tenancies Act 1995 or an Agricultural Holdings Act 1986 tenancy

If you’re a tenant, it’s your responsibility to check whether taking part in the pilot will breach the terms of your tenancy agreement.

If you only have access to land under a licence arrangement, it’s unlikely you have sufficient control of the land to carry out the actions under the standards in the pilot agreement.

You can enter land parcels that:

• do not have an existing agri-environment agreement on them - for example if you have a land parcel in Countryside Stewardship, it will not be eligible for the pilot
• are in England
• are not common land or used for shared grazing

You do not have to include your whole farm - you can choose which land parcels you want to include.

How land use affects land parcel eligibility

The Rural Payments service will automatically check which of the land parcels you’re including are compatible with individual standards. This is based on the land use declared on your BPS 2021 application at 17 May 2021.

This does not affect the hedgerow or water body buffering standards.

This table gives details of the land uses compatible with the standards.

Standard	Eligible land use
Arable and horticultural land	arable land use, including: field vegetables, horticulture and temporary grassland – for example, winter wheat (AC66)
Arable and horticultural soils	arable land use, including: field vegetables, horticulture and temporary grassland – for example, winter wheat (AC66)
Farm woodland	non-agricultural land use (woodland – WO12)
Improved grassland	permanent grassland (PG01) or temporary grassland (TG01)
Improved grassland soils	permanent grassland (PG01) or temporary grassland (TG01)
Low and no input grassland	permanent grassland (PG01)

3. Applying the standards to land parcels

In some cases, you can select more than one standard for the same land parcel. For example, you could apply the arable land and arable soils standard to the same area of land and select the hedgerows standard for hedges around it.

The individual standards pages explain which standards can be applied together. If you select multiple standards for one land parcel, you’ll have to do all the actions in each standard.

You can select a different ambition level for the standards in your agreement. For example, you could choose to do the intermediate hedgerows standard and introductory water body buffering standard.

You cannot select different levels for different land parcels under the same standard. For example, you cannot apply the introductory arable land standard to one land parcel and the intermediate arable land standard to another.

Your pilot agreement will allow you to change ambition levels and to add or remove standards.

If you want to use the hedgerow standard

You’ll be asked for a length (in metres) of hedgerow when you apply.

Enter half of the total length of the hedge if you only have control over one side, for example a roadside hedge or a hedge bordering a neighbour’s land. However, you can enter the whole length if you have a legal right or obligation to maintain the hedge and can fulfil the actions under the standard.

If you want to use the water body buffering standard

You’ll be asked for the length (in metres) of water body buffers when you apply.

If you only have control over one side of the water body, you should only enter half its length.

If you’ve got buffers on both sides of a watercourse, include both.

You cannot overlap these areas with the buffers in other standards – for example, if you include a water body buffer along the side of an arable field, do not also include it as an arable buffer.

You should do a run-off and soil erosion risk assessment before you apply. This is so you can identify where to place buffers, prioritising higher-risk areas.

You can read this advice for help to complete a runoff and soil erosion risk assessment.

If your land is in a site of special scientific interest (SSSI)

If your land is designated as an SSSI, you can only apply the following standards:

• arable and horticultural land
• arable and horticultural soils
• hedgerows
• low and no input grassland

If your application includes SSSI land, you’ll need consent from Natural England.

Make your request for consent when you get your agreement offer. Send a copy of the offer along with a notice form to: ProtectedSites@naturalengland.org.uk

Your agreement cannot start without SSSI consent.

If your land is conditionally exempt from Inheritance Tax

If HMRC has designated your land as either conditionally exempt from Inheritance Tax (Heritage Property Relief) or the object of a maintenance fund, you’ll be able to apply most of the standards normally.

You will not be able to claim payments for the maintenance of in-field trees on the following standards:

• arable and horticultural land
• improved grassland
• low and no input grassland

The low and no input grassland standard may conflict with the undertakings for your heritage property. Check the low and no input grassland standard for more details.

Check if your land is conditionally exempt from Inheritance Tax.

Make your application

Use the Rural Payments service to make your application.

Read separate guidance to help you use the service.

You’ll have until 30 September 2021 to submit your application.

If you need to request a change to your application

You can request changes to your application for an agreement, such as:

• adding and removing land parcels
• making mapping changes
• changing standards and ambitions levels

You can make these changes before and after you submit.

Find out how to request a change.

What happens when your agreement offer is ready

You’ll get an email that will tell you your agreement offer is ready for you to check.

You’ll be able to download and view the agreement offer from the Rural Payments service.

These pages also form part of your agreement:

• terms and conditions
• monitoring guidance
• learning guidance

The monitoring and learning guidance is a mix of general information and some things that you must do as part of your agreement. Where the monitoring and learning guidance says that you ‘must’ do something, this forms part of your agreement.

When your agreement begins and ends

Your start date will be in the agreement offer that you download.

Your pilot agreement will run for 36 months.

Contact the RPA

Send an email with ‘Sustainable farming incentive’ in the subject line to ruralpayments@defra.gov.uk

You can also call or write.

Rural Payments Agency
Telephone: 03000 200 301
Monday to Friday 8.30am to 5pm, except bank holidays
Find out about call charges

PO Box 352
Worksop
S80 9FG

Further information

See all the Sustainable Farming Incentive pilot guidance.