Farmland wildlife has been decimated by intensive crop growing using
pesticides, grubbing up hedges, ploughing heathland and draining
marshes, etc. With too many sheep grazing our moors, hills and
mountains, a range of upland plants, invertebrates and birds has been
diminished and the land converted to closely-grazed turf, perfect for
heavy rain to cause catastrophic downstream floods. Once common farmland
birds have declined by 54% since 1970 with farmland invertebrates
declining by 40% in a few decades. Since the 1930s a staggering 97% of
our once flower-rich meadows has been lost. Ploughing a New Furrow
examines these stark figures and in the context of Brexit considers the
unprecedented opportunity for wildlife once again to be nurtured by
Britain's farmers alongside food production, reversing the enormous
plant and animal losses our farmland has suffered. With its financial
largesse, the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) has encouraged farmers to
destroy huge areas of wildlife habitat in Britain's lowlands and
seriously damage large tracts of our uplands, depleting Britain's farmed
land of much of its wildlife. With responsibility for farm policy to be
transferred back to the UK, these enormous losses could be reversed and
Britain's farms made wildlife-rich once more. This book is based to a
significant extent on conversations with farmers and on the achievements
and experiences of some farmers who have made good use of
agri-environment payments to reinstate lost habitats and manage their
remaining wildlife more sensitively. The author sets out the case for
removing or capping subsidies, supporting organic and other more
sustainable forms of agriculture and the conservation of soils and the
rich life forms they hold. He proposes a set of policy changes and other
measures that should be adopted by the Government post-Brexit to make
the 70% of our land that farming occupies rich in wildlife again.
Literally food for thought!
