The Revised Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) scheme

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has set out details of the revised Sustainable Farming Incentive (SFI) scheme, which is expected to open in 2026 as part of the next phase of environmental land management support in England.

The SFI is a government programme that pays farmers for a range of land management activities designed to support sustainable farming alongside food production. Under the refreshed offer, the scheme will be streamlined with fewer actions and clearer rules on land use, and Defra has said it will provide more detail on individual actions and payment rates before applications begin.

To improve accessibility and manage limited budgets, Defra has confirmed that there will be two application windows in 2026:

• June 2026: an initial window open to farmers with small farms and farmers without existing Environmental Land Management (ELM) agreements. Exact definitions of these groups will be published before the window opens.

• September 2026: a second window that will be open to all farmers meeting the general eligibility criteria.

Defra has said it will publish clear budgets and updates for each window, and will avoid closing windows without warning, which was an issue in earlier versions of the scheme.

Further reading:  Revised SFI Scheme