New SFI ‘must support smaller farms’ says Defra minister

The new iteration of the Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI), expected in 2026, must support smaller farms and be simpler to engage with, Defra farming minister Dame Angela Eagle has said.

Giving evidence to the cross-party Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Efra) committee in Westminster on Tuesday (16 December), Dame Angela said it was not right that 25% of SFI funding goes to just 4% of farms.

“I don’t like that kind of distribution,” she said, adding that it was more of an issue given that the old Basic Payment Scheme was almost at an end.

See also: Fresh SFI delay storing up ‘massive problems’ for farmers in 2026

Scheme uptake

Dame Angela confirmed that the new SFI is expected to go live from April 2026, and Defra aims to simplify the application process.

With environmental targets to be met, it was imperative the new system encourages more farmers to be involved.

“I do want to have a system where, after you’ve been in the fields all day, you can come back and make your application without having to go through hell or employing somebody to do it,” she said.

Dame Angela told the committee that work to make the system more user-friendly is ongoing, and the technology needed to make that happen is being developed.

“I think we need to stabilise and simplify our current system and have some consistency going forward, so farmers know what it is that we want them to do,” she said.

A cohesive scheme

Commenting on what the new scheme might look like, the minister suggested a move away from the current piecemeal approach.

“If you look at the distribution of what has actually been bought with these schemes in the past, we’ve over-bought some things, such as herbal leys and various other things,” she said, adding that this needed to be avoided.

She also emphasised the need for sustainable farming, noting that improving soil health boosts productivity.

However, with about 44,500 SFI agreements covering roughly 50% of farmed land, achieving environmental targets will require future SFI efforts to engage more farmers.

Avoiding past blunders

To avoid repeating previous blunders, the minister told the committee Defra is going to be “much more transparent about how it’s going as we’re going along” and that it is “working on what we can do to communicate that in real time”.