Farming Today

18/02/2025 - UK peatlands at risk, agroforestry tree guide and competing land use


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The majority of the UK's peatlands could be at risk of drying out in the next 40-50 years because of climate change - according to a new study from scientists at the Universities of Exeter, Manchester and Derby. Healthy, wet peatlands are seen as part of the solution to climate change because they soak up planet-heating carbon dioxide - UK peatlands currently store an estimated 3.2 billion tonnes of carbon. But where they dry out, they become a problem, because they can then release that stored carbon back into the atmosphere.

There are a lot of things we want from the land of course - food production, green energy, housing, space for nature - and often these things are seen as being in competition with one another. We visit a farm where many different types of land use have been integrated so they can work hand in hand.

And tree planting is something else that faces criticism for taking land out of food production. But in agroforestry systems, trees are planted alongside livestock or crops. We find out about a new tree species guide for UK Agroforestry Systems which has been produced by Forest Research and the University of Reading, to help farmers decide what to plant and where.

Presented by Steffan Messenger

Produced by Heather Simons

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