14/02/14 - Science for, with or by policy makers?

Last Friday's lecture was all about policy making and the science behind it. Certain aspects of the talk linked well with the Daphnia lecture the week before (policy making being very loosely based on science), and most of the talk covered areas and schemes I'd never heard about before.

Dr. Sophie Wynne-Jones of Aberystwyth University presented the lecture, which was focused on the Pontbren Project. This is a project where 10 neighbouring farms, in Llanfair Caereinion, North Powys, covering ~1000 hectares, work together to manage the land in a sustainable manner that improves the natural environment, catchment hydrology and stock quality. An introduction and the history of the project can be found here: 
http://www.pontbrenfarmers.co.uk/project_background.html, but essentially the project started with 3 farms replanting hedgerows and shelter belts for their sheep; this then expanded to include 10 farms, all of which now manage the land to allow hardier sheep breeds to lamb outdoors, and to return to a less intensive, higher quality beef and lamb raising environment.

Dr. Wynne-Jones' talk focused on the balance that must be struck between farmers, doing all the actual ground work, and the policy makers (NRW, Welsh Government, LEADER, Scottish Power etc) deciding where funding goes. This balance is difficult to meet, and involves a lot of communication and data collection to support both sides equally. Sophie conducted research to produce a report that assessed how successful the project had been. Although her salary was paid for by the Welsh Government, she felt compelled to listen to the farmers and report their story as well as possible.

Overall the report seemed to show that the farmers methods of restoring, and being in charge of their own land worked far better than the prescriptive methods of agroenvironment schemes, such as Tir Gofal. By studying the land and historical maps, they were able to decide which areas were best for planting hedgerows, trees and creating ponds. By using their own knowledge of the farms, they produced a far more successful landscape in protecting their livestock and improving hydrology to reduce erosion. The project shows that by communicating more with farmers, agroenvironment schemes can be produced that fulfil both the needs of the policy makers and the farmers. 

I've worked closely with farmers for many years and have very rarely found any that talk kindly of the "government" - implying policy and funding bodies. This is because these bodies produce unreasonable targets, demand planting in areas it will never work, and very rarely explain why the work needs to be done. At Pontbren, the researchers have explained why stocking less intensively may help increase the health of the flock, why planting trees and hedgerows will reduce runoff and improve the retention rate of fertilisers, and explained the science behind all the other changes made on the farms. With this knowledge, the farmers have been far more keen to cooperate with the "outsiders", and have even taken that knowledge and implemented ideas that have seen improvements both economically and environmentally for the farms.

Hedge laying to create natural shelter for livestock and reduce runoff

This talk has opened my eyes to the general lack of communication between farmers and agroenvinoment policy makers, and showed me why there is such enmity between the two. Pontbren has proven that with better communication and explanation, the two sides can work together towards a common goal that improves yield, increases profits and restores the environment to a much healthier level. Hopefully the lessons learnt from Pontbren can be formalised and implemented across the country. If this happens we will have a lot happier farmers, a healthier ecosystem and economy, and far less money wasted on pointless agroenvironmental schemes that farmers don't conduct properly because no one explains the reasons behind them.