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The Ythan Project

Agri-Environment Schemes and Water Management Plans

Agri-Environment Schemes

Rivers and burns benefit from sensitive management of the land around them. This can be achieved in a number of ways and doesn’t have to be costly to the farmer. The project aimed to raise awareness of the actions that farmers and land managers could take to protect their local river.

One way to protect burns is the creation of un-cropped strips of land next to watercourses. These strips of land intercept some of the water and soil that can run off the surface of fields and prevents the soil from entering the watercourse. Ideally the strips of land are also fenced off and this prevents livestock entering the water and causing erosion damage to the riverbanks.

There are a number of government grants which may enable the farmer to be compensated for the loss of productive land if they create these strips and the project aimed to give farmers information about these grants and how they can access them.

This included information on the Scottish agri-environment scheme, called the Rural Stewardship Scheme, which is run each year on a competitive basis. During 2003 and 2004 farmers in the Ythan catchment area who applied to this scheme, and agreed to undertake work which would be of benefit to the river, were given a letter of support from the project, which enabled them to receive extra points on the ranking system, giving them a better chance of getting into the scheme.

In 2003, 42 farmers in the Ythan catchment received letters of support from the project for their applications, and 40 of these applications were successful. In 2004, 30 farmers in the Ythan catchment received letters of support and all these applications were successful.

As well as writing letters of support for farmers who decided to apply to the scheme, the Project also aimed to raise all farmers awareness of the scheme and its possible application to their farms. To do this project staff undertook a series of farm visits around the catchment area, providing information on the scheme and offering farmers advice on how they could potentially use the scheme.

During the life of the project, a total of 200 farmers from around the catchment were either visited, or received letters of support, or both, from the project. By the end of the project the catchment area had schemes running on about 25% of the farms in the area, as compared to the Scottish average, which is for schemes to be running on 11% of farms.

Water management plans

The project also produced farm specific water management plans for farmers, which will tell them how they can protect the water resources on their farm. The actions in these plans will not only benefit the environment, but many of them will also have clear financial advantages for farmers in the long term.
The plans also showed how the various actions enable farmers to qualify for particular sections of quality assurance schemes, thereby increasing the market for their products.

By the end of the project, these plans had been produced for 102 farms in the Ythan catchment area.

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