The UK Farm Assurance review A call for evidence from farmers: Survey closes on 31st August

20/08/24 - News

The comprehensive independent evaluation of the UK’s farm assurance schemes announced by the Commissioners of the UK Farm Assurance Review is well underway.

The project, jointly set up by the National Farmers' Union (NFU) and AHDB, along with NFU Cymru, the Ulster Farmers' Union (UFU) and NFU Scotland (NFUS), is focussed on repurposing UK farm assurance for a post-Brexit world.

The independent review of the UK Farm Assurance System is planned to report at the end of this year. The Commissioners leading this review have issued an online survey that can be completed by any farmer in the UK, from any sector, which will help provide evidence for the review and will assist in the development of its recommendations.

Dr David Llewellyn, the Lead Commissioner has said: “The survey has been open for a few weeks now and has been widely publicised. We have had a strong response to date from farmers from all sectors and all parts of the UK.

The survey will be open for farmers to complete until the 31^{st of} August. We are still seeking further views, and this is the opportunity for farmers to tell us your experiences of farm assurance. This is so that we hear directly from the farming community on this important issue. The survey will take around 10 – 15 minutes to complete.

The survey can be found at: https://app.onlinesurveys.jisc.ac.uk/s/promaraf-2021/the-uk-farm-assurance-review. We are really looking forward to the further participation in this survey of as many farmers as possible, as part of their contribution to this important review. Our evidence gathering will also involve direct engagement by the Commissioners with other key stakeholders.

With farmers responding directly to the Commissioners, and not via the sponsors of the review, we intend to ensure that our work will be both independent and transparent and that we can hear from a wide cross section of those engaged with farm assurance systems from across the UK”, concluded Dr Llewellyn.

About the Commissioners

The following have been appointed to act as Commissioners for this review:

Dr David Llewellyn CBE (Lead Commissioner) – former Vice Chancellor of Harper Adams University
James Withers – former Chief Executive Officer of Scotland Food and Drink
Mark Suthern – Chair of Trustees of the Farming Community Network (FCN)
Katrina Wiliams CB - a former civil servant holding senior positions in Defra, the Scottish Government and as part of the UK Permanent Delegation to the European Commission