Asked by: Rebecca Smith (Conservative - South West Devon)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if his Department will carry out full impact assessments of the (a) social and (b) economic impact of Environmental Land Management Schemes on upland farms.
Answered by Daniel Zeichner - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Uplands farmers will have a key role to play in the future for delivering sustainable food production and our environmental targets. We are committed to Environmental Land Management (ELM) schemes and will work with the sector to optimise the schemes, ensuring they produce the right outcomes for all farmers including upland farms, while delivering food security and nature recovery in a just and equitable way.
We plan to increase the transparency of schemes by publishing data on the impact they are having, including on upland farms. We will confirm next steps in the rollout of other ELM schemes, including how we will publish this data, in due course.
Asked by: Rebecca Smith (Conservative - South West Devon)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether he plans to enable agri-environment agreement applications before the current agreements expire.
Answered by Daniel Zeichner - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Farmers with existing agri-agreements can apply to enter the Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) if the activities under each scheme are compatible and they will not be paid twice for a similar activity on the same area of land at the same time. We are fully committed to making the Environmental Land Management schemes work for all farmers. We will confirm plans for further rollout of the schemes as soon as possible.
Asked by: Lord Bishop of Norwich (Bishops - Bishops)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to meet international obligations for nature conservation, including the Ramsar Convention, the Bern Convention and the EU Birds and Habitats Directives.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The UK meets its obligations under the Bern Convention as well as the EU Birds and Habitats Directives through the implementation of the Conservation of Species and Habitats Regulations (2017) and the Wildlife and Countryside Act (1981). The UK is also an active member of the Ramsar Convention on wetlands and protects 176 Ramsar sites, more than any other country. We are playing a proactive role in preparations for the Ramsar COP15, taking place in Zimbabwe next July. The UK Government also meets our international obligations through proactive participation in other multilateral environmental agreements, including the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species and the Convention on Migratory Species.
Asked by: Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government, in light of the complaint in relation to the Government's badger culling policy being considered by the Bureau of the Standing Committee of the Bern Convention at its third meeting of 2024, what methods have been used to measure the badger population since 2012 to ensure local extinction events do not take place.
Answered by Baroness Hayman of Ullock - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
As part of the existing badger control licensing policy, for intensive and supplementary badger control, Natural England set minimum and maximum numbers of badgers to be removed, in order to comply with commitments under the Bern Convention. This is to ensure the badger control operations deliver disease reduction benefits without endangering the local badger population.
The number of badgers removed and extent of culling activity is also closely monitored by Natural England during the operational period to ensure local extinction of badgers is avoided and to monitor the humaneness, safety and effectiveness of these culls. In addition, prior to licence authorisation, Natural England can also conduct sett surveys and sett checks in order to determine whether there is badger activity present in an area and that local extinction has not occurred.
On 30 August, the new Government announced the start of work to refresh the Bovine TB strategy for England, to end the badger cull by the end of this parliament and drive down disease to save cattle and farmers’ livelihoods. This work starts immediately and includes the launch a new survey to start this winter to update estimates of badger abundance and population recovery.
Further details can be found on GOV.UK at https://www.gov.uk/government/news/government-to-end-badger-cull-with-new-tb-eradication-strategy (attached).
Asked by: Wera Hobhouse (Liberal Democrat - Bath)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps he is taking to reduce food waste; and what discussions he has had with industry representatives on the best way to tackle the issue.
Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Department will hold discussion with the supply chain on a range of issues including how to prevent waste.
We remain committed to the programme of work led by The Waste and Resources Programme (WRAP) to drive down surplus and waste across the supply chain, with the aim to halve food waste by 2030.
The guidance Food and drink waste hierarchy: deal with surplus and waste - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) offers tools and advice to food businesses.
Asked by: Wera Hobhouse (Liberal Democrat - Bath)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether his Department is taking steps to support the application of the food and drink waste hierarchy for surplus food.
Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Department will hold discussion with the supply chain on a range of issues including how to prevent waste.
We remain committed to the programme of work led by The Waste and Resources Programme (WRAP) to drive down surplus and waste across the supply chain, with the aim to halve food waste by 2030.
The guidance Food and drink waste hierarchy: deal with surplus and waste - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) offers tools and advice to food businesses.
Asked by: Rebecca Smith (Conservative - South West Devon)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps he is taking to help ensure that people farming on commons can benefit from (a) the Sustainable Farming Incentive and (b) Countryside Stewardship.
Answered by Daniel Zeichner - Minister of State (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
We want people farming on commons land to benefit from both the Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) and Countryside Stewardship and are working to make applications to the SFI service available to commoners and other shared graziers. We have asked farmers on commons interested in applying to SFI to contact the Rural Payments Agency so that we can help farmers to prepare to apply and be ready when the application service is available. We will set out more details of the Countryside Stewardship Higher Tier offer in due course. To help with a group’s costs of administering a common land SFI agreement, an annual additional payment of £7 per hectare of eligible common land is available.
Asked by: Anna Dixon (Labour - Shipley)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps his Department is taking to help tackle sewage discharges into the River (a) Aire and (b) Wharfe in Shipley constituency.
Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Government has taken immediate and substantial action to address water companies who are not performing for the environment or their customers. In July, we announced swift action to begin resetting the water sector, including ringfencing vital funding for infrastructure investment and placing customers and the environment at the heart of water company objectives.
In September, Government introduced the Water (Special Measures) Bill to parliament to give regulators new powers to take tougher and faster action to crack down on water companies damaging the environment and failing their customers. These are the first critical steps in enabling a long-term and transformative reset of the entire water sector.
I would also refer the hon. Member to the Written Statement made by the Secretary of State on 18 July, HCWS3.
Asked by: Adam Jogee (Labour - Newcastle-under-Lyme)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether he plans to meet with representatives of the charity Asthma and Lung UK.
Answered by Emma Hardy - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Secretary of State and the Ministerial team are in the process of meeting a wide range of stakeholders since their appointment to the department.
Asked by: Wera Hobhouse (Liberal Democrat - Bath)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that food waste reporting requirements on businesses are (a) effective and (b) not overly burdensome.
Answered by Mary Creagh - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The previous Government held a consultation wherein stakeholders were asked about their views on the scope of any reporting requirements. It can be found at Improved food waste reporting by large food businesses in England - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
The Waste and Resources programme (WRAP) led voluntary Food Waste Reduction Roadmap supports business to target, measure and specifically act on reducing food waste. The roadmap includes guidance and templates for reporting developed by industry in collaboration with WRAP and the Institute of Grocery distribution (IGD) with funding from DEFRA. WRAP regularly reports on the progress of the roadmap and works closely with businesses to quality assure reported data and ensure that it is fit for purpose.
Ministers will consider any mandatory food waste reporting requirements in due course.