Breakdown of specific environmental funding and Common Agricultural Policy payments: EIR release

Information requested

Information on funding for a number of schemes in Scotland - historic and current spending/funding information for:

• The Agri-environment climate scheme championing biodiversity on agricultural land, from the initiation of the scheme until the most recent round of funding.
• The Biodiversity Challenge Fund.
• Common Agricultural Policy payments for Scottish farmers from 2004 onwards.

Response

1. The tables at Annex A in the attached document outlines the funding commitments for the Agrienvironment scheme from when it started up in 2015 up until now.

2. Biodiversity Challenge Fund (BFC)

Paid 2019/20 (£ Millions)	Paid 2020/21 (£ Millions)	Paid 2021/22 to date (£ Millions)	Total paid to date (£ Millions)
1.050	2.435	0.213*	3.698

* The projected total spend for 2021/22 is £2.7 Million. Some funding committed for BCF has not yet been drawn down by supported projects, in part due to delays as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.

3. Some of the information you have requested is available in the Economic Reports on Scottish Agriculture, which were compiled by the Rural and Environment Science and Analytical Services Division in the Scottish Government. These reports present an overall picture of Scottish agriculture using data from various agricultural surveys that they manage.

For Common Agricultural Policy payment figures (2003-2019) please see the Scottish agriculture tables - economic report: 2020 edition - gov.scot (www.gov.scot) sections – ‘A12 (i) Agricultural payments and subsidies included in the aggregate account, 2003 to 2019’ and ‘A12 (ii) Agricultural other payments and subsidies not included in the aggregate account, 2003 to 2019’ (tab labelled A12i & A12ii).

Under regulation 6(1)(b) of the EIRs, we do not have to give you information which is already publicly available and easily accessible to you in another form or format.

Not all scheme are included in the economic report so please see Annex B in the attached document for funding figures for the following schemes: Beef Efficiency Scheme (BES), Scottish Forestry Grant Scheme (SFGS), New Entrant Start Up Grant Scheme (NESUG), Young Farmers Start Up Grant Scheme (YFSUG) and New Entrant Crofting Grant Scheme (NECG).

With regards to the 2020 Common Agricultural Policy payments we are still processing these; over 99% of the value across all schemes has been paid out with a value of over £530m delivered to the rural economy. The table at Annex C in the attached document provides the 2020 CAP funded figures split across the schemes.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.

FOI - 202100223717 - Information Released - Annex A to C

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