Asked by: Victoria Atkins (Conservative - Louth and Horncastle)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how much is the average annual payment per hectare is for agreements entered into under Sustainable Farming Incentive 2026.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The estimated mean annual payment per hectare for live Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) 2026 agreements is £224, as of 16th October 2026.
Asked by: Victoria Atkins (Conservative - Louth and Horncastle)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps she will take with that part of the Sustainable Farming Incentive 2026 budget that was not spent.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Around £3 million of the SFI26 Window 1 budget remained following the closure of that window. This funding was rolled forward into Window 2. The full budget for SFI26 has now been allocated.
Asked by: Victoria Atkins (Conservative - Louth and Horncastle)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if she will make it her policy to provide sufficient funding to the Sustainable Farming Incentive 2027 to cover expiring agreements and to meet the expected level of demand from farmers seeking to deliver environmental outcomes.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
We have allocated a record £11.8 billion to sustainable farming and food production over this Parliament. We are investing more than £2.7bn a year in farming and nature recovery. Overall farmers and land managers will benefit from an average of £2.3bn a year for farming schemes. This includes funding for the Environmental Land Management schemes paid to farmers increasing by around 150%, rising from £800m in 2023/24 towards £2bn by 2028/29. There will be future Sustainable Farming Incentive offers and, in keeping with the Farming Roadmap 2050, we plan to make an SFI27 offer available.
Asked by: Victoria Atkins (Conservative - Louth and Horncastle)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if she will make her policy to opening the Sustainable Farming Incentive 2027 in sufficient time to allow agreements to commence from 1 April 2027.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
There will be future Sustainable Farming Incentive offers and, in keeping with the Farming Roadmap 2050, we plan to make an SFI27 offer available. Following the closure of SFI26 Window 2, we are working with farming representative organisations and the wider sector to consider how we refine the scheme for SFI27. We will share further details as early as possible.
Asked by: Victoria Atkins (Conservative - Louth and Horncastle)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what support she will provide to farmers with Countryside Stewardship Mid-Tier and Higher Tier agreements expiring in December 2026 who have not secured a Sustainable Farming Incentive 2026 agreement.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Farmers with expiring Countryside Stewardship Mid-Tier agreements may be able to apply for future environmental land management offers, including a planned SFI27 offer, where they meet eligibility criteria. Natural England is contacting Higher-Tier customers whose agreements expire in December 2026 to discuss options, including a new Countryside Stewardship Higher Tier.
Asked by: Victoria Atkins (Conservative - Louth and Horncastle)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what proportion of this financial year's farming budget has been committed.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Government’s farming schemes are demand-led and many give farmers flexibility on when they claim, and in some cases, what they claim each year. This enables farmers to implement agreements that suit their businesses and helps the Government meet its ambitions for sustainable food production and the environment.
This means the proportion of the Farming Budget committed at any point in the year does not provide a complete picture of anticipated spend. Defra retains flexibility to allocate funding to schemes within year to maximise scheme uptake and use of the budget rather than setting rigid allocations.
The department will publish the Farming Annual Report covering 2026/27 around September 2027.
Asked by: Victoria Atkins (Conservative - Louth and Horncastle)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what the cost is of the live existing agreements for a) Sustainable Farming Incentive, b) Countryside Stewardship and c) Landscape Recovery.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The latest complete year figures are provided in the 2025/26 Farming Annual Report. They show that in that year Defra spent:
Information on 2026/27 will be published around September next year. Final values will depend on claims made by agreement holders.
Asked by: Victoria Atkins (Conservative - Louth and Horncastle)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether the entirety of the £5 billion committed over 2024/25 and 2025/26 was spent.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Defra published the 2025/26 Farming Annual Report in September this year. It showed that the department spent a total of £4,936 million from the Farming Budget across the financial years 2024/25 to 2025/26.
Asked by: Victoria Atkins (Conservative - Louth and Horncastle)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what the remaining budget is for the Sustainable Farming Incentive for new agreements over the course of this Parliament.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Farming Budget is not allocated to individual schemes on a fixed basis across the Parliament.
The Government’s farming schemes are demand-led, and offer farmers flexibility over when they claim and, in some cases, what they claim each year. This enables farmers to implement agreements that suit their businesses while delivering outcomes including for the environment.
Funding is allocated flexibly to ensure the Farming Budget is made available to farming businesses in schemes that work for them. Defra will continue to announce scheme budgets before launch and to publish the Farming Annual Report setting out how the Farming Budget is spent each year.
Asked by: Victoria Atkins (Conservative - Louth and Horncastle)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how much funding has been allocated to the farming budget across this Parliament by financial year.
Answered by Stephen Morgan - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Defra allocated £5 billion to the farming budget for the years 2024/25 to 2025/26. At the last spending review Defra allocated an average of £2.3 billion per year for the years 2026/27 to 2028/29.
The department reports annually on how the faming budget was spent. The latest Farming Annual Report, covering 2025/26, was published in September this year.