A grand plan for the land

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Articles by Rory

Rory McIvor

Investment Communications Specialist

1 July 2022

After almost four decades working in financial markets, Harry Buscall retired from Ruffer in 2020 to embark on a new adventure with his son Dominic at his family farm, Ken Hill in Norfolk.

Using a combination of rewilding, regenerative farming and traditional conservation practices, the team at Ken Hill have devised an innovative approach to sustainable land management.

Rory McIvor caught up with Harry, to find out more about his approach to the UK’s land use conundrum.

What are you trying to achieve?

We hope to embed a new approach which allows us to thrive economically whilst meeting the challenges of climate change, biodiversity decline and the need for sustainable food production.

At Ken Hill, rather than look at the risks under our nose we have tried to identify the major trends which will dominate the debate in the years and decades to come.

So we’re considering issues like carbon storage, water shortage, soil erosion and land as a provider of public goods.

To put it in terms with which Ruffer clients will be well acquainted, our hope is that this approach will build a genuinely diversified portfolio of natural assets enabling long-term compound growth for generations to come.

British farming appears to be at a critical juncture, whats the situation on the ground?

There is significant polarisation in the debate amongst farmers and landowners on how best to manage land and the environment. The UK policy setting for farming, the environment, and rural wellbeing is at its most dynamic for decades.

The economics of farming for most averaged-sized holdings has been turned on its head by Brexit, which brought an end to payments made via the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). The CAP payments essentially masked a lot of loss-making farming businesses – the curtain has now been pulled back.

CAP payments are being replaced by UK government schemes more oriented to good environmental management – although the detail and quantum of the payments are yet to be fully laid out.

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#climate change, #responsible investment

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A grand plan for the land