Farming Today

02/02/22 Funding for landscape wide conservation, rural health and social care report, sheep farming after Brexit

Farming Today

Hundreds of square kilometres of England could be transformed under the Government's most ambitious landscape-scale conservation project. The Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has just opened applications for the Landscape Recovery Scheme. It’s part of the new β€˜public money for public goods’ system, which replaces the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy. Up to 15 projects will be taken forward, each one up to 5 thousand hectares or 50 square kilometres. The projects will concentrate on restoring threatened species and ecosystems, recovering streams and rivers and adapting landscapes for climate mitigation. A warning that people living in rural areas have less access to health and social care than their urban counterparts. A 3 year investigation by MPs and the National Centre for Rural Health and Care calls for a rural strategy to help tackle inequalities accessing NHS and care services in rural areas. All week we're checking in with farmers, two years since the UK left the European Union. Back in 2019, we heard from Helen Roberts who works for the National Sheep Association in Wales and produces pedigree and commercial sheep on her farm near Oswestry. We caught up to see how she is doing now. Presented by Anna Hill and produced by Beatrice Fenton.

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