'Only last month SQC announced that LEAF marque certification would be offered to members alongside its own annual assurance audit, delivered through the certification body, Food Integrity Assurance (FIA) – meaning both audits can now be carried out jointly with other assurance schemes

'Get tae Falkirk!'

I suppose it might be a sign of a misspent youth (or even a debauched early adulthood) but the news that the regenerative farming get together, Groundswell, which has taken place south of the Border for a number of years is to have a fringe event in Scotland brought to mind this euphemistic exclamation from Channel 4’s 1990’s comedy sketch show, Absolutely.

It certainly took me a wee while to work out why the Scottish event, which will take place on Saturday, July 1 was named 'GO Falkland', but apparently the initials come from Groundswell Outreach and while it’s independently organised, it has the backing of the increasingly popular Hertfordshire event which takes a regenerative approach to providing a mix between the Cereals Event and some of the ethos of a music festival.

Anyhoo, I guess it shows that there’s a bit of a growing interest in regenerative farming – despite the fact that there’s long being a fair bit of scepticism about the lack of a single unified, or universal set of rules to oversee and define the practice – and that it can cover a whole range of approaches.

While this apparent lack of regulation might have been viewed as a way for multi-national corporations to grab some green sustainability credentials by claiming that all their producers will have to use regenerative principles, some of these big companies have taken at least some steps to codify and verify the fact that sustainable principles are being followed.

Part of this has been the adoption of the LEAF marque by some of the big buyers as their guarantee that the approach is being taken seriously.

Only last month Scottish Quality Crops (SQC) announced that LEAF marque certification would be offered to its members alongside their own annual assurance audit, delivered through the certification body, Food Integrity Assurance (FIA) – meaning that both audits can now be carried out jointly with other farm assurance schemes to reduce the number of inspection visits.

With the likes of Pepsico, which owns Cupar-based Quaker Oats, requiring those growing for them on contract to work towards becoming LEAF-marque certified, the move could have save a good deal of time for quite a number of growers.

“There are more than 100 farmers in Scotland growing for Quaker Oats who are all working towards LEAF marque certification,” said SQC’s managing director, Teresa Dougall.

"One of the key asks of our members is to minimise the time and pressure of audits, and as part of this commitment to growers we are delighted to now be able to offer this service through FIA to streamline LEAF Marque audits into one assessment where possible.”

She added that the LEAF marque was now widely used and, in some cases, required by large retailers to demonstrate the robust environmental and business commitment of individual business and that they were making full use of Integrated Farm Management, a whole farm approach that included soil and water management, pollution control, energy efficiency, landscape conservation and community engagement.

So, while it could be argued that it might be a useful and perhaps soon required marketing gambit, it was interesting to note that one of the country’s leading livestock auctioneers, the affable managing director of United Auctions, George Purves, said that he had been noticing that there were some real signs that growers were once more realising that livestock had a role to play in improving the soil fertility in arable units.

He said that in recent years he’d been noticing an increasing number of arable farmers from the country’s arable East regions, who hadn’t kept livestock for some time, returning to the marts to purchase store cattle with, he said, the aim of helping restore soil health on their farms.

Highlighting the value of dung produced by cattle and sheep as a source of nutrients, he also pointed out its ability to improve overall soil health as well.

“This natural method of managed grazing can increase the soil’s organic matter and enhances its structure and fertility with improved water infiltration, reducing erosion and the need for synthetic fertilisers. Importantly, sustainably managed land also improves carbon capture and storage,” he pointed out.

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But stating that the move had so far only scratched the surface he said that there was a real potential for more people to get involved in regenerative farming:

“We’re encouraging arable farmers to consider keeping livestock as part of their farming enterprises. Integrating livestock can also help diversify the farm’s income streams and reduce dependence on a single crop.

“With soil health firmly back on the Government’s agenda, and stewardship grants available to help with costs, I believe that farms, farmers, consumers and our environment would all benefit from keeping cattle, sheep and to help naturally fertilise the land and keep farms in good heart.

“After all, farmers have always been stewards of the land and inherent environmentalists long before today’s global focus.”

Recent work at the SRUC had also shown that grazing winter wheat with sheep in the early spring can significantly reduce the disease burden of crops – helping to reduce the fungicide bill.

With a growing interest in the use of cover crops over the winter to reduce the depletion of nutrients, such as nitrogen, the use of fodder crops like stubble turnips or forage rape in this role could provide a second income from land that is to be spring cropped.

However, it would be fair to say that one of the biggest impediments to the mass return of livestock to arable areas has probably been the fact that so many fences were pulled up as fields had been amalgamated to make them less hassle to work with the ever bigger machines which are now the norm.

But technology could come to the rescue – for while there is a cost involved, it’s far less costly to move electric fencing about some arable acres than it would be to provide permanent fencing for the same sort of area. Also, as 'virtual' fencing, which combines GPS and electronic collars to set boundaries for stock, becomes a mature technology, then the job might become even simpler.

So, with all these changes coming slowly but surely coming together maybe it might just be time to leave Falkirk to its wheel and the Kelpies – and decide to 'Get tae Falkland!'