Former NFU chief economist Dr Derrick Wilkinson adds his voice to growing concerns at the appointment as new AHDB chair of regen ag and alternative markets champion, Emily Norton, and the implications this may have for the levy board’s strategic direction at a time when it needs to focus more than ever on supporting high-yield, resource-efficient agriculture. He warns UK farmers not to fall for the ‘jam tomorrow’ promises of lower-yielding regenerative agriculture, whose future profitability depends on projections of highly uncertain alternative income streams such as carbon credits. He urges them instead to focus on factors within their control to make their businesses as productive and efficient as possible. Relying on government payments and income from dodgy carbon markets is no basis on which to build the nation’s future food security, he writes. Funded by the industry, for the industry, AHDB should maintain a laser focus on food production. The organisation’s activities are levy-funded per tonne or per litre of production. If AHDB drifts towards a lower-yielding, regenerative agriculture agenda, it might as well sign its own death warrant, he warns.  

 

I share Paul Temple’s concern at the appointment of regen ag and alternative markets champion Emily Norton as chair of AHDB, and the implications this may have for the levy board’s strategic direction at a time when it needs to focus more than ever on supporting high-yield, resource-efficient agriculture. 

 

We are clearly not alone. Last week, Farmers Weekly reported that it had received a number of letters expressing similar concerns about Ms Norton’s ‘apparent enthusiasm for lower-yielding farming systems’. 

 

Of course, Ms Norton assured Farmers Weekly that her attitude towards productive agriculture had changed, and that there is ‘room for a wide range of farming systems’. No surprises there. 

 

But leopards and spots spring to mind, and the farming industry should be very wary of where Ms Norton leads the levy board under her tenure, as well as who is ultimately appointed as the organisation’s new chief executive following Graham Wilkinson’s decision to return to the commercial world after little more than a year in post.

 

That’s because Ms Norton seems to believe that the way we currently farm and produce food in this country is fundamentally broken. She recently likened our food system to the ‘Titanic’. 

 

In March last year, she also observed that “farmers had purpose when we were feeding the world, but time has been called on this mission,” adding that a “renewed sense of purpose is the real magic I can see behind the regenerative agriculture movement”.

 

Despite her insistence that there is room for a wide range of farming systems, Ms Norton’s vision for a profitable farming industry appears fairly one-dimensional, and it lies in encouraging a transition to regenerative farming practices, supported by alternative private sector income streams such as carbon credits, biodiversity net gain payments, and a sustainable price premium for regen ag products.      

 

In fact, it is ironic that Ms Norton should have described the regen ag movement as ‘magic’ because, only last month, calling on the Government to provide clear direction on the future for UK agriculture, NFU President Tom Bradshaw warned that: “The magic money tree from the private sector has been promised for 10 years and not materialised. It’s a pipe dream.”

 

The basis for Ms Norton’s misplaced optimism possibly lies in a June 2023 research brief produced by Savills UK (where she was previously head of research), entitled ‘Is regenerative agriculture financially viable?’

 

As I have previously observed, this research makes a number of bold projections about the relative future profitability of regenerative agriculture compared to conventional. It suggests that it only takes six years for regenerative farming to become more profitable than conventional. Here’s how it works:  

 

Net margins for regenerative agriculture are assumed to be 41% lower in year one of the transition, primarily due to 31% lower yields, However, after six years of soil fertility and soil organic content building - despite still yielding 24% lower than conventional – the profitability of regenerative agriculture is forecast to be higher based on three key assumptions:

 

1. regeneratively farmed products will attract a 16% price premium;

2. SFI payments will remain unchanged and at the same level; 

3. carbon payments equivalent to £38/ha will also be available.    

 

Each of these three assumptions takes us into the realms of unknown and unchartered territory. Indeed, many thousands of farmers in England were unable to access SFI payments after the scheme ran out of money earlier this year. How do the calculations stack up for them? 

 

More fundamentally, even this rose-tinted projection for the future profitability of regen ag acknowledges that it would still result in a 24% yield gap behind conventional production. Or, put another way, a requirement to find 24% more food from somewhere else, potentially at even greater cost to nature and biodiversity. 

 

Writing in the journal Science, conservation scientist Professor Andrew Balmford FRS and colleagues recently estimated that exporting our food system requirements elsewhere could be up to five times more damaging to global biodiversity if more biodiverse regions of the world are required to increase their food output as a result of misguided policies to reduce agricultural production here.

 

We must be open-eyed about these trade-offs, as well as the flimsy basis for future projections of alternative markets and new income streams from the private sector. Relying on government payments and income from dodgy carbon markets is no basis on which to build food security.

 

On this issue, I am completely aligned with Richard King, head of business research at The Andersons Centre, who recently advised:  "Farmers should not look to external sources to provide financial success. The businesses focus on the things they can control, namely running an efficient and productive farm with an eye on the long-term.”

   

Only last week, speaking at the Royal Highland Show, EFRA Committee chair Rt Hon Alistair Carmichael MP cautioned: “If food security is national security, then food production must be at the heart of agricultural policy - and right now, it’s not”

 

Funded by the industry, for the industry, AHDB should also maintain a laser focus on food production. The organisation’s activities are levy-funded per tonne or per litre of production. If AHDB drifts towards a lower-yielding, regenerative agriculture agenda, it might as well sign its own death warrant. 

 

Dr Derrick Wilkinson is a retired UK economist with nearly 40 years’ international experience with the development, analysis, integration and coordination of global trade, environment and agriculture policies. A former chief economist at both the NFU and CLA, he is the author of numerous pioneering papers and research projects published, including in major peer reviewed journals.