The land use challenge in the United Kingdom: Finding space for food production and biodiversity

The nations of the United Kingdom have set ambitious policy targets for land-based activities and outputs including around food production, climate change and biodiversity. As land area is constrained these targets risk not being met without coordinated policy. Maximising the public and private benefits from the land requires understanding the trade-offs and synergies between different activities, and the comparative advantage of different areas in producing different outputs. The “three-compartment model” has emerged as a conceptual tool to guide land use policy where land can be broadly classified as being managed (i) primarily for food; (ii) for a mixture of food and public goods and (iii) for non-agricultural outputs, including nature. It was adopted by England’s National Food Strategy (2021). The paper reviews two classes of critical response to the three-compartment model: (i) concerns from conventional agriculture, and (ii) worries by proponents of low-input agriculture. It attempts to understand the basis of the criticisms and how they might be addressed. Given the urgency with which land use is required to meet policy targets the paper concludes by arguing that a properly articulated three-compartment model can be a means of bringing together different stakeholders to act in the immediate future.