The government yesterday (18 March) published its final Land Use Framework, following last year’s consultation on the earlier draft. The Countryside Alliance has been reviewing the final document to start to assess how far the concerns we raised on behalf of rural communities, farmers and land managers have been addressed. Significant concerns remain: most notably its remarks about shooting.
The document makes much of the importance of “multifunctional” land, which delivers benefits in more areas than one, but says that because of unspecified “trade-offs”, land managed for shooting has a limited ability to do so. This despite the fact that on virtually all land where shoots operate, they coexist with agriculture (often as a secondary component of the overall land use), and land management techniques that support game shooting also fulfil a vital conservation function. The government says it therefore wants to explore going further on licensing shooting and imposing conditions, but a still more restrictive approach would only undermine the critical economic, social and conservation contribution made by well-managed shooting.
The Framework stops short of offering firm safeguards for food production. While it acknowledges the importance of food security in principle, there is still too little clarity on how the government will prevent further loss of agricultural land to other uses such as large-scale energy infrastructure, tree planting schemes and development. Without stronger policy direction, the cumulative impact could still undermine the UK’s food security. Similarly, while the Framework signals the need to support land managers, it lacks the long-term certainty around funding that is essential for confidence and investment, and it fails adequately to acknowledge the contribution of existing private conservation efforts.
The cultural and aesthetic value of rural landscapes also remain under-recognised. While it pays some notice to the character of our iconic landscapes, the Framework does not fully reflect the importance of traditional land management in maintaining the heritage and tourism value of areas such as the uplands.
Our proposal for a formal Rural Community Impact Assessment has not been meaningfully adopted. While the Framework refers to engagement and inclusivity, it does not establish any clear mechanism to ensure that rural voices are systematically considered in land use decisions. This remains a critical gap that our recommendations on how the government can reconnect with the countryside are ideally placed to fill.
The final Framework does reflect some of our core messages about the need for balance and pragmatism. Despite the lack of safeguards, it includes a clearer acknowledgement than in the draft that food production is a fundamental function of land use, and that environmental ambitions must be delivered alongside, not at the expense of, food security. It also signals growing understanding of the need for coordination across competing policy objectives, in the face of demand pressures on land from housing, energy, nature recovery and agriculture. This reflects our call for a more joined-up strategy and could be a step toward more coherent policymaking. There are also positive indications on the accessibility of data and guidance for land managers, letting them make better-informed long-term decisions.
The final Land Use Framework is not without positives, but the assault it signals on shooting is totally out of step with its overall objective and it fails to address fully several of our other concerns.
Stronger protections for food production, clearer long-term support for farmers and land managers, a proper understanding of shooting and a more explicit commitment to rural communities will be essential if the Framework is to succeed in practice.