Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to improve the farming recovery fund.

The Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) and Countryside Stewardship Higher Tier (CSHT) agri-environment schemes currently fund a range of actions offering multi-year support for farmers to manage and reduce flooding on their land. Defra provides grants such as BFS1: 12-24m watercourse buffer strip on cultivated land and CSW24: Manage grassland for flood and drought resilience and water quality. The Government will be opening a new round of SFI for applications from small farms and those without an existing SFI agreement this summer and the CSHT scheme is open to those who have been invited to apply by the Rural Payments Agency.

The Farming Recovery Fund was used to make exceptional, one-off recovery payments to support farmers affected by Storms Babet, Henk and severe wet weather over the winter of 2023 and 2024 to help cover the uninsured costs of restoring farmland. Farmers are encouraged to continue managing their own risk by taking actions in their own business to build resilience, including taking advantage of commercial insurance markets. There are no plans to open the Farming Recovery Fund at this time.