Farmers should be paid to protect 'carbon banks', says National Trust

Hill farmers to be given financial incentive to conserve peatlands, Britain's biggest carbon store
James Meikle
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday November 12 2008 00.01 GMT

The Peak District near Hartington. Photograph: Don McPhee
Hill farmers should be rewarded for protecting wildlife, landscapes, water and carbon stores as well as livestock, the National Trust said today.
It warned that rising costs of food production and the global recession would make it even more difficult for livestock owners to make a living at a time when English and Welsh governments are seeking to replace existing subsidies paid to hill farmers.
The trust, which has 2,000 tenant farmers, most of them in upland areas, is already involved in pilot schemes to improve water quality at source, so water companies do not face such high costs at treatment plants, and in providing wetland areas to reduce the risk of flash floods.
It also wants financial incentives for farmers who conserve "carbon banks" in the soil including peatlands which are the largest carbon stores in Britain.
Peatlands are the single largest carbon reserve in the UK, storing around 3bn tonnes of carbon, more than in the woodlands of Britain and France combined. In areas such as the Peak District, over-grazing has been partly blamed for the erosion of peatland and worrying releases of carbon.
Iwan Hughes, the trust's director for Wales, said: "Ten years ago any notion that hill farmers would farm for water or for carbon would have been dismissed as fantasy. But with the pressures of a changing climate and the need to protect and value our natural capital, the future of hill farming will focus on a mixture of food production and providing wider environmental benefits for society."
So far the value of farms in managing countries' national assets was largely unrecognised. "With the right investment , these farms could be rewarded for their important contribution to our wildlife as well as the management of the finite resources such as water and soil which will benefit as all."