
Overview
Generally, this has led to spectacular increases in production but has often unintentionally had a detrimental effect on wildlife.
While numbers of wild bird species across all habitats have remained relatively static in the UK, the Farmland Bird Indicator is now at its lowest level ever - less than half of its 1970 value.
The continuing drive to produce more food to satisfy growing human populations, lifestyle changes and the need to mitigate the impact of climate change on agricultural production means UK farming will continue to intensify.
To address continuing agricultural change and the pressures it places on wildlife, we operate a large and varied research and monitoring programme across all types of UK farmland.
This has identified many of the relationships between environmental impacts and wildlife population declines and land management solutions which address the problems at minimal cost to farmers.