It has recently been announced by Natural England that from the 1st January 2015 all current Environmental Stewardship Agreements will be realigned to run from January to December every year.
This will mean that Farmers with a current Environmental Stewardship Agreement which started on 1st April for example, will be realigned so the claim period is synchronised to January to December.
Although Natural England stressed that this will not affect the total amount of money that farmers are due to receive under their Agreement, the dates on which they receive their payments will alter.
Carys Williams of Rostons explains “that the 1st January has been used by Natural England to synchronise with the rest of the EU and allows the Stewardship Agreements to run alongside the Single Payment Scheme year, this in turn will help to simplify cross-checks between Single Payment and Environmental Stewardship claims.”
Natural England is also providing a payment timing tool for individual agreement holders to view the impact of the timing of their payments, which is available on-line.
Should you wish to discuss this in mire detail then please feel free to contact the Rostons Team on 01829 773000, who would be delighted to assist with any queries you may have.