Reflections on the 2023 Oxford Farming Conference

I was lucky enough to be on the delegate list at last week's Oxford Farming Conference. Not having attended before, I was struck by the prestige of the buildings that held us, the quality of the speakers and the incredible knowledge of the attendees I chatted to.

High on the agenda at this year's conference was the topic of farmer support during this period of high uncertainty. We heard from the Bulgarian-born Chief Operating Officer of Chambers, a fruit-farming enterprise, who lamented the issues that Brexit posed for trade and employment in the sector.

Meanwhile, Sir Charles Godfrey, in his talk on land use in the UK, laid out his vision for the adaptations required face of increasing food demand and the urgent need to halt biodiversity decline. Highly pragmatic in his suggestions, he highlighted the fact that, in reality, ‘no land is farmed sustainably' and that the UK countryside in the future will likely consist of (a) land managed chiefly for agricultural outputs, (b) land managed for the ‘multiple benefits' of food and environmental services and (c) land managed for non-food outputs (rewilding, reforestation). He stressed how important it is that the concept of ‘public money for public goods' be supported and integrated into future policy, particularly as farmers face existential uncertainty without the Basic Payment Scheme. This concept, so positively touted after its first appearance in a government paper in 2019, has now been concerningly side-lined following a string of Conservative administrations.

Closing the first full day of the conference was Tim Smit, innovator and founder of the Eden Project. Somewhat refreshingly (I'd heard from several delegates that the conference atmosphere was overly sanitised this year, perhaps because it was decided that no questions were to be taken from the live audience), he spoke in a brutally honest fashion about the fear from people in power to make brave decisions at a time when they're most needed. Using an example of a city-centre wetland project in Derby, which was spawned from a letter to him from an allotment owner, Tim also stressed the urgent need to think truly BIG.

Tim's speech contrasted to the words of the ‘establishment' speakers including Mark Spencer, the Secretary of State for Food, Farming and Fisheries, who took the opportunity to spell out changes to ELMS (higher payments for SFI and CS and the introduction of new payments to cover admin fees). Over three days where delegates heard a range of galvanising stories, the DEFRA minister's words did not seem to match the energy and vision of the rest of the conference.

One of the last presentations came from Paralympian Samantha Kinghorn, who had the audience in tears as she recounted how she overcame the trauma of a life changing injury, sustained on her family farm, to train to be a top wheelchair racer, winning two Olympic medals and breaking a world record. She finished with the line: “life can be long or short, so why spend it doing anything that you don't love?”.