Outside of biodiversity loss, the UK is also facing significant soil degradation. Soils are the largest terrestrial carbon reservoirs and provide fundamental ecosystem services, including the provision of food and habitats and the regulation of water and climate. Soil organic matter (SOM) is a fundamental component of soils and a major determinant of soil health, containing stores of carbon and nitrogen bound together with other mineral nutrients. Soil organic carbon (SOC) makes up about 40-60% of SOM, and strongly influences the physical, chemical and biological structure and function of soils.
Land management in the UK is at a crucial transition with the trailing out of European Union farming subsidies, changes to the legislative frameworks for farming and environmental policy, and the launch of the ambitious Environmental Improvement Plan 2023. Nature Recovery land management has been recognised as an essential part of our carbon strategy as well as addressing the biodiversity crises.
The SYSC project titled “linking soil carbon and land management for South Yorkshire agricultural soils” sought to measure soil carbon content in agricultural soils across the region to find out how much carbon is locked in them. It wanted to understand what form it is in, how long it is likely to stay there, and how this relates to different land management practices. The “Nature Recovery Farming: Supporting the Transition” project looked to address the challenges faced by farmers and land managers in navigating new environmental policies.
Key Insights:
Currently there is a very limited understanding and insufficient data on soil health nationally, with the Environment Agency claiming that more investment is needed to monitor soils effectively. To address this knowledge gap in South Yorkshire, a SYSC research project is sampling and analysing soils from sites under agricultural and conservation land management to generate better insights into how different land uses influence soil carbon storage across distinct carbon pools. As part of the SYSC Consolidated Research Report this has been explored in the “Soil Carbon Storage Across South Yorkshire” case study. Across South Yorkshire farms, soils were collected from arable, long-term arable, mixed arable-pasture, long-term pasture and woodland sites, with some sites being sampled at different depths. Carbon content and bulk density of soils from both agricultural and conservation settings were measured, and SOC, black carbon and total organic carbon stocks calculated. Whilst this research project and result analysis is still ongoing, the emerging findings suggest that regardless of land use, the denser soils tend to store less carbon and that carbon decreases with depth, displaying declines in SOC between surface soils (uppermost 10 cm) and lower depths – which is a typical pattern even in healthy soils. However, this decline was less obvious on land that is under conservation land management and on one site the total organic carbon stocks were greater than the UK national average.
The research also highlights the vulnerability of surface soils to disturbances and compaction associated with unmanaged grazing, highlighting the importance of incorporating soil health assessments into grazing regimes for the mitigation of substantial carbon losses. With grazing farms being a predominant type in Yorkshire and the Humber, this is particularly relevant for South Yorkshire.
However, placing land under management plans requires resources, knowledge and skills that may be inaccessible to some farmers. Whilst there is commitment in legislation to support new environmental management via the Agriculture Act (2020) and Environment Act (2021), there is considerable uncertainty about how policy and legislation will translate into a tangible funding regime. Although current government grants to increase productivity and manage land to benefit the environment exist via different funding streams of the environmental land management (ELM) scheme, these can also be difficult to navigate and require time and know-how to apply for and administrate successfully.
Another SYSC project explored nature recovery farming in South Yorkshire, by interviewing people working in land management and farming in South Yorkshire and the Peak District National Park about their experiences of navigating the current funding and policy landscape. This has formed the “Nature Recovery Farming” case study for the Consolidated Research Report. The research found that remaining financially viable is the most pressing concern amongst farmers and, whilst many are willing to take some land out of production in order to access funding and support nature restoration, many felt driven to do this because of unstable markets for farm produce. Farmers and land managers need stable funding sources that support financial viability alongside pro-environmental interventions as well as support from trusted people and organisations to access and manage grants, so that they can carry out the day to day work of producing food and ecosystem services for the region. Whilst collaboration is welcomed, there is also wariness about it leading to a loss of control over land, and decision making being transferred to the collective.
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