Countryside Stewardship Scheme

The Countryside Stewardship Scheme was originally an agri-environment scheme run by the United Kingdom Government set up in 1991. In its original form it expired in 2014. It was relaunched for the Rural Development Programme England (RDPE) 2014-2020 with £3.1bn of government subsidy for agriculture and forestry, replacing the previous Environmental Stewardship scheme.

Countryside Stewardship:

• will contribute around £900 million to help protect and improve our environment.
• will be open to all eligible farmers, foresters and land managers
• is a competitive targeted scheme, with grants awarded to those who will make the biggest improvements in their local area.
• replaces Environmental Stewardship (ES), the English Woodland Grant Scheme (EWGS) and capital grants from the Catchment Sensitive Farming (CSF) programme.

Forestry Commission and Natural England will jointly delivery Countryside Stewardship. Natural England will broadly lead on the set up and delivery of transactional services for Countryside Stewardship for the first year of the new scheme.