Our Projects & Partnerships

Home / Sustainable Farming / Our Projects & Partnerships

Beacons of Excellence

The Bea­cons of Excel­lence pro­gramme looks to devel­op peer-to-peer learn­ing and explore the ben­e­fits of regen­er­a­tive agri­cul­ture and agroe­col­o­gy. Build­ing on LEAF’s lega­cy, it will take our work to anoth­er lev­el of knowl­edge gen­er­a­tion and exchange. The first year of this pro­gramme was kind­ly fund­ed by the Ash­den Trust.

Learn more

Nature Based Solutions to Climate Change

Supported by The Linder Foundation, LEAF’s ‘Nature Based Solutions to Climate Change’ project is assisting with the work of 10 farmers who are using nature to mitigate climate change and build resilience on their farms.

Learn more

Resilient & Ready

LEAF have teamed up with global crop protection and seed company Corteva Agriscience in the search to develop new LEAF demonstration farmers as emerging leaders in sustainable farming.

Learn more

Accelerating & Demonstrating the Journey to Net-Zero

Devel­op­ing five net-zero farms across the four nations and over­seas to demon­strate prac­ti­cal knowl­edge and help farm­ers achieve the Nation­al Farm­ers’ Union tar­get to be net-zero car­bon by 2040.

Learn more

We are proud of our ongoing partnerships and collaborations, building connections and strengthening our impact on sustainable farming.

Nitro­gen Effi­cient Plants for Cli­mate Smart Arable Crop­ping Sys­tems (NCS)

NCS is a four-year, ground-break­ing indus­try-led research project to sup­port farm­ers in reduc­ing agri­cul­tur­al emis­sions by increas­ing pulse crop­ping in arable rota­tions and sub­sti­tut­ing 50% of import­ed soya meal used in feed with more cli­mate-friend­ly home-grown puls­es and legumes.

Find Out More

Jor­dans Farm Partnership

The Jor­dans Farm Part­ner­ship is an inno­v­a­tive part­ner­ship between LEAF, The Wildlife Trusts, Jor­dans and The Prince’s Coun­try­side Fund to pro­mote sus­tain­able farm­ing prac­tice and address rur­al devel­op­ment issues.

Find Out More

Vitacress Farm Excellence

Vitacress Farm Excel­lence with LEAF Mar­que cer­ti­fi­ca­tion is an out­­­comes-based approach to mea­sur­ing envi­ron­men­tal improve­ments through eco­log­i­cal appraisals and sur­veys, indi­vid­u­al­ly tai­lored con­ser­va­tion man­age­ment plans and bespoke LEAF Sus­tain­able Farm­ing Review Report­ing with KPIs and action plans for con­tin­u­ous improvement.

Hamp­shire & Isle of Wight Wildlife Trust (HIWWT) is proud to part­ner with Vitacress on the Farm Excel­lence pro­gramme in line with their Wilder strat­e­gy to pro­mote sus­tain­able farm­ing and nature’s recov­ery. Arca­di­an Ecol­o­gy and Con­sult­ing is a whol­ly owned sub­sidiary of HIWWT who have worked with Vitacress Farm Excel­lence to pro­vide pro­fes­sion­al eco­log­i­cal and farm advice.

Find Out More

We also work with a range of partners across Europe, in several ground-breaking, collaborative and transformative projects.

ENVI­SION

Mon­i­tor­ing of Envi­ron­men­tal Prac­tices for Sus­tain­able Agri­cul­ture Sup­port­ed by Earth Obser­va­tion will be con­duct­ing research on the mon­i­tor­ing of envi­ron­men­tal prac­tis­es. The three year project aims to car­ry out con­tin­u­ous and sys­tem­at­ic mon­i­tor­ing of sus­tain­able agri­cul­tur­al prac­tices on a ter­ri­to­ry wide and all year-round basis. A tool­box of ser­vices will be devel­oped, enabling mon­i­tor­ing organ­i­sa­tions to adapt to require­ments stem­ming from EU pol­i­cy reform.

Find Out More

SHOW­CASE

This project is focused on SHOW­CAS­ing syn­er­gies between agri­cul­ture, bio­di­ver­si­ty and Ecosys­tem ser­vices to help farm­ers cap­i­tal­is­ing on native bio­di­ver­si­ty (SHOW­CASE) and is ded­i­cat­ed to the inte­gra­tion of bio­di­ver­si­ty into farm­ing prac­tices. The project aims to deliv­er new insight and inno­v­a­tive tools facil­i­tat­ing the agri­cul­tur­al sector’s tran­si­tion towards more sus­tain­able farm­ing, and thus help meet wider soci­etal needs.

LEAF works on the project along­side the Uni­ver­si­ty of Read­ing and has recruit­ed a range of farm­ers across the UK as part of a Euro­pean wide net­work of Exper­i­men­tal Bio­di­ver­si­ty Areas (EBAs). The farms have tak­en part in a tri­al look­ing at how dif­fer­ent species of cov­er crops dif­fer in their frost tol­er­ance, help­ing to illus­trate the inter­ac­tions between bio­di­ver­si­ty and agri­cul­ture. The project is also explor­ing the incen­tives that effec­tive­ly moti­vate farm­ers to inte­grate bio­di­ver­si­ty prac­tices into pro­duc­tion and strate­gies to encour­age the imple­men­ta­tion of bio­di­ver­si­ty man­age­ment on farms.

Find Out More

SolACE

SolACE (SOLu­tions for improv­ing Agroe­cosys­tem and Crop Effi­cien­cy for water and nutri­ent use) looks at ways to improve agroe­cosys­tem and crop effi­cien­cy for water and nutri­ent use. A num­ber of LEAF pota­to grow­ers have been shar­ing their exper­tise with project part­ners, oth­er farm­ers and sci­en­tists. We will also be lead­ing on the dis­sem­i­na­tion and com­mu­ni­ca­tion aspects of the project, includ­ing devel­op­ing fact­sheets, short videos and pol­i­cy briefs. SolACE runs for five years.

Find Out More

IPM­WORKS

IPM­WORKS is a 4‑year hori­zon 2020 project that aims to pro­mote the adop­tion of Inte­grat­ed Pest Man­age­ment (IPM) strate­gies through an EU-wide net­work of farm­ers. The IPM Net­works con­sist of 5 exist­ing nation­al farm demo net­works and 24 new hubs of demo farms. These net­works will facil­i­tate peer-to-peer knowl­edge shar­ing at a nation­al and EU-lev­el and demon­strate to farm­ers the tan­gi­ble eco­nom­ic and eco­log­i­cal ben­e­fits of adopt­ing IPM strategies.

LEAF play a key role in the mon­i­tor­ing and eval­u­a­tion of demon­stra­tion activ­i­ties to sup­port farm­ers in learn­ing about the tech­ni­cal and eco­nom­ic effec­tive­ness of the demon­strat­ed strate­gies and to help to moti­vate farm­ers to apply these strate­gies on their own farms. We also sup­port the devel­op­ment and build­ing of IPM Net­works, dis­sem­i­na­tion, com­mu­ni­ca­tion and train­ing and net­work sus­tain­abil­i­ty. To learn more about the project, vis­it the web­site and pub­li­ca­tions webpage.

Find Out More

SEAMS

SEAMS (Sus­tain­abil­i­ty in Edu­ca­tion and Agri­cul­ture using Mix­tures) is a four-year project fund­ed by the Esmée Fair­bairn Foun­da­tion, and coor­di­nat­ed by the James Hut­ton Insti­tute. The project aims to devel­op, pro­mote and imple­ment crop species mix­tures as a sus­tain­able crop pro­duc­tion sys­tem for Scot­land and a resource for knowl­edge exchange on food pro­duc­tion, agri­cul­tur­al ecol­o­gy and envi­ron­men­tal sus­tain­abil­i­ty to a wider audi­ence includ­ing school groups. 

Find Out More

AgriCaptureCO2

This H2020 fund­ed 3‑year project looks at the poten­tial of soil as a car­bon sink whilst pro­mot­ing the imple­men­ta­tion of regen­er­a­tive agri­cul­tur­al prac­tices. AgriCaptureCO2 is devel­op­ing an inno­v­a­tive, robust, and scal­able solu­tion to mea­sure car­bon cap­ture in soil. The project aims to make soil car­bon mea­sure­ments more accu­rate and cost-effec­tive by com­bin­ing satel­lite images with farm­ers’ data and soil sam­ples. A com­mer­cial plat­form will be launched to facil­i­tate large-scale zero emis­sion aspi­ra­tions, through mon­i­tor­ing and report­ing on regen­er­a­tive agri­cul­tur­al prac­tices, as well as mea­sur­ing and mon­i­tor­ing soil car­bon seques­tra­tion. The project will also sup­port and accom­pa­ny farm­ers on the jour­ney to regen­er­a­tive agri­cul­ture by build­ing a com­mu­ni­ty of prac­tice. The ulti­mate goal: to pro­mote regen­er­a­tive agri­cul­ture as a solu­tion in the fight against cli­mate change while pro­vid­ing agro­nom­ic and eco­nom­ic benefit.

Through webi­na­rs, on-farm debates, farm demon­stra­tion days and more, LEAF will con­tribute to devel­op­ing a Euro­pean Regen Agri Net­work that engages and con­nects farm­ers, sci­en­tists, busi­ness­es, and oth­er rel­e­vant actors. LEAF’s exist­ing net­work of LEAF Demon­stra­tion Farms will also play a piv­otal role in pro­mot­ing knowl­edge exchange and pro­mot­ing Regen­er­a­tive Agri­cul­ture and the Agr­i­Cap­ture plat­form to farm­ers. The LEAF Mar­que team are also involved in report­ing on the use of Earth Obser­va­tion in Regen­er­a­tive Agri­cul­ture. To learn more about the project, vis­it the infor­ma­tion por­tal and the pilot farms web­page, and find out how to get involved here.

Find Out More

Diver­IM­PACTS

The over­all goal of Diver­IM­PACTS (Diver­si­fi­ca­tion through Rota­tion, Inter­crop­ping, Mul­ti­ple Crop­ping, Pro­mot­ed with Actors and val­ue-Chains towards Sus­tain­abil­i­ty) was to achieve the full poten­tial of diver­si­fi­ca­tion of crop­ping sys­tems for improved pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, deliv­ery of ecosys­tem ser­vices and resource-effi­­cient and sus­tain­able val­ue chains. Diver­IM­PACTS was made up of 34 part­ners and the project was fund­ed under Hori­zon 2020, the Euro­pean Union’s frame­work pro­gramme for research and inno­va­tion. The project was com­plet­ed in 2022, with key out­puts of the project being avail­able here.

Find Out More