Norfolk Landscapes Conference debates nature recovery issues

The Norfolk Landscapes Conference, the first of its kind, brought together more than 400 landowners, farmers, researchers and conservationists at the Norfolk Showground's events centre.

It illustrated the importance of the county's "natural capital", amid the worrying national declines in wildlife and habitats, and the growing challenge of climate change.

Future land management and nature recovery strategies were discussed at the inaugural Norfolk Landscapes Conference at the Norfolk Showground (Image: Chris Hill) To hit nature recovery targets, delegates discussed the need for landowners to collaborate with each other, and with advisory bodies, to navigate the "confusing" landscape of funding schemes aimed at restoring biodiversity to the countryside.

That could include public-funded environmental land management (ELM) incentives, or leveraging private investment via new initiatives such as Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG), through which credits can be sold to developers to offset the habitats lost in their building projects.

Among the keynote speakers was Prof Andrew Lovett of the UEA's school of environmental science, who said key natural assets are widely dispersed across Norfolk and Suffolk - making the space between them a vital target for ecological improvements.

"In my view, that is where there is the biggest opportunity to make a difference," he said. "And that, of course, is a working farmed landscape, so we have to think about what the challenges of farming are and how we might address them in the future.

"How do we try to integrate, on a farm level or a landscape level, the productive farming that is so important for our county with these different nature objectives and, very importantly, the different environmental income sources that could be increasingly important for many of our farmers and landowners?"

Future land management and nature recovery strategies were discussed at the inaugural Norfolk Landscapes Conference at the Norfolk Showground (Image: Chris Hill) Prof Lovett said key challenges for farmers included making water supplies more resilient, making the soil more productive, improving the management of agrochemicals, and widening crop diversity in rotations.

The conference also heard from Dr Peter Brotherton, director of science at Natural England, who said the government has committed to halt the decline in species abundance by 2030.

To meet this target, he said the first priority is to "fix our best places for nature", such as SSSIs and other wildlife habitats which are the "core sites on which the rest of the nature network depends" - while also creating "large contiguous areas of wildlife habitat".

"Size really matters for ecosystem recovery," he said. "Big sites usually contain more species than small ones, as well as a larger population of each species, so they are more resilient."

Future land management and nature recovery strategies were discussed at the inaugural Norfolk Landscapes Conference at the Norfolk Showground (Image: Denise Bradley) One land management company already working on large-scale nature restoration projects is Albanwise Environment, whose environment manager Andy Millar outlined efforts to create nature-rich wetlands in west Norfolk, with the help of private funding like BNG.

"Colleagues are still trying to plot what appears to be the right pathway through these funding mechanisms, and it is not straightforward - but I think that is a message that has shone through today," he said.

His advice to other land managers was: "Be bold and aim high.

"If you have a vision for a piece of land, stick with it," he said. "If you start with the nature outcome and allow that to drive the scheme, rather than the scheme driving the nature, then we will be heading in the right direction."

The Norfolk Landscapes Conference at the Norfolk Showground. From left, conference chairman Emily Norton with panellists Susanna Stock, Chris Gerrard and Poul Hovesen (Image: Chris Hill) The conference also featured discussion panels including farmers, funders, bankers and other landscape stakeholders including Anglian Water.

Poul Hovesen, chairman of the Catalyst Farming partnership in north Norfolk, said collaboration was vital for nature recovery.

"I think food production sits very comfortably with nature recovery," he said. "If we can identify where we can optimise the land for agriculture it will leave us more land to allocate land for nature recovery. If we can do that in a more sustainable way, we have a win-win. But we can only do it if we work together."

Norfolk Wildlife Trust chief executive Eliot Lyne closed the conference by explaining his vision for the future.

"We have to move from 'either growth or nature' to 'both growth and nature'," he said.

"We have got to move from lots of bitty projects to fewer, bigger more ambitious programmes, we have got to stop thinking small-scale short-term, and think large-scale long-term and move from fragmentation to collaboration.

"What does that look like? We could have Norfolk as the hub of a thriving national and international nature economy - the centre of UK thinking for integrating farming and nature.

"We have such a great natural heritage and natural capital already, and I would like to see nature become part of how we do business in Norfolk. It is part of what makes us special."

Silent seminars

The event began with an innovative series of "silent seminars", delivered via headphones to allow attendees to switch between presentations.

Rohit Kaushish, chief economics adviser for the National Farmers' Union, said emerging environmental markets for biodiversity and carbon could be an attractive source of diversified income for farm businesses, if structured correctly. If not, they carry "significant risks with intergenerational implications", he said.

"One thing we hear a lot from farmers is that the policy landscape is too confusing," he added.

"It is important to bear in mind that we are in the very very early stages of these markets, and there is a lot still being worked out."

Mr Kaushish said the risks included the "large scale displacement of food production due to land sparing", while the fast-evolving policy landscape is "undermining the ability and confidence of farmers to engage in emerging environmental markets" - particularly for smaller farms and tenants, who were encouraged to explore "cluster" partnerships.

More benefits of "ecological cooperation" between farmers were outlined by farmer David Lyles, who was instrumental in forging the North Norfolk Coastal Group (NNCG) and now leads an association of farming clusters across Norfolk and Suffolk.

Delegates were also shown other examples of farm-based nature projects including an extensive soil monitoring study at Morley Farms near Wymondham, river and wetland restorations by the Norfolk Rivers Trust, as well as agroforestry trials.

And Jake Fiennes, of the Holkham Estate, explained how he had used 20 environmental indicators to create a new rating system for "natural capital performance" which can be measured, improved, and used to entice private investment.

County-wide Nature Recovery Strategy

A new strategy is being developed aiming to help focus nature recovery efforts across Norfolk and Suffolk.

The Norfolk and Suffolk Nature Recovery Partnership includes both county councils, local planning authorities, wildlife trusts, farming bodies, conservation organisations and government agencies.

Next summer, it expects to publish its Local Nature Recovery Strategy (LNRS), described as a "critical new tool for driving the national ambition to increase species abundance and reduce risk of species extinction".

Partnership manager Jen Burlingham told the Norfolk Landscapes Conference that the strategy will target nature recovery projects and funding in areas where they can bring the biggest benefit, and guide the decisions of planning authorities.

"It is very much about prioritising nature recovery in the right place and it is something that local planning authorities must take note of," she said. "It cannot be left on the shelf, it has to be used to guide future developments."

Earlier this year, the partnership consulted the public and landowners to identify which species and habitats were regarded as the most important, and the team is now working to develop a lists of priority species, and to map areas particularly important for biodiversity - and areas with potential to become important.

Farming perspective

One of the farmers attending the event was Joe Mitchell, from Repps with Bastwick near Great Yarmouth.

"What we are trying to do is clear the murkiness between what we have done in the past and what is happening in future," he said.

"Moving forward, if you want to do big landscape schemes we are going to be looking at private money - so how do we access that private money? 

"There is great scope with things like BNG, but it depends on where you are. Are you next to a development that requires BNG units for that scheme to go ahead? Also these are all long-term agreements, 30-plus years, so there are still questions about how that is going to be treated by the taxman. And if you have got land with borrowings against it, how do the banks view these schemes? There are lots of questions.

"But what today does show is we have got 400 people in here all wanting to enhance and improve the Norfolk landscape, from all sorts of organisations, so hopefully we can all start talking to each other and hopefully achieve something big."

The conference was organised by Norfolk FWAG (Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group), in partnership with the Royal Norfolk Agricultural Association, Albanwise Environment, Norfolk County Council, Norfolk Wildlife Trust, WWF and Farmers Weekly.