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Trees – A tool to offset your farm’s carbon and gain extra income
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Tilhill Forestry offers farmers a professional one-stop service for selling woodland generated carbon units, woodland creation, management, and timber harvesting. We help farmers get even better value from otherwise less productive land.
The incentives for farmers to plant trees have never been better. That is the upshot of the government’s determination to increase our tree planting rates across England. And it means that, for both livestock and arable farmers, tree planting now offers a compelling and lucrative use for the less productive parts of their farm.
Tilhill is ideally equipped to help farmers tap into these benefits. Our team of professional forestry managers can maximise the grant funding available for planting, they will design the woodland, plant the trees and ensure a thriving and healthy woodland emerges.
Tilhill is partnered with Maelor Forest Nurseries which supplies healthy, home-grown saplings. Finally, Tilhill’s woodland carbon division, CarbonStore, helps farmers generate carbon credits from their tree planting efforts and has a waiting list of companies keen to buy carbon credits generated from new woodland creation projects.
© Tillhill
A large portion of the incentives (mentioned earlier) are delivered through the English Woodland Creation Offer (EWCO). This offers farmers up to £8,500 per hectare to cover the capital costs (e.g., the trees, fencing etc) necessary to establish the woodland.
EWCO also provides annual payments of £200 per hectare per year for the woodland’s first 10 years to help cover maintenance costs. Finally, a further payment of £2,800 per hectare is available if the woodland provides wider benefits such as public access, flood mitigation or ecological enhancement. Tilhill’s forestry managers can help you maximise these various benefits.
On top of the government’s subsidies, newly-planted woodlands could also generate income from both timber and carbon credits.
Assuming the woodland captures 350 tonnes of carbon per hectare and each carbon credit (i.e., one tonne of sequestered carbon) is worth £20 (as an example figure), carbon income could generate a further £7,000 per hectare. CarbonStore can advise you on this.
Finally, if you’re planting conifers or productive broadleaves, the woodland could also yield some meaningful timber income. Each hectare could grow roughly 450 tonnes of timber with each tonne worth about £50 (as an example figure). That generates a further £22,500 of income per hectare.
The grand total of these various income streams available means a farmer, by working with Tilhill, CarbonStore and Maelor to create a woodland, could be earning up to £600 per hectare per year over the next 60 years from planting trees.
This is a steady, reliable income stream which, by using the marginal parts of the farm, helps lift margins and optimises the wider land use.
Contact:
David McCulloch,
CarbonStore.
Tel: 01786 649387.
Email: info@carbonstoreuk.com
Website: www.carbonstoreuk.com
Simon Marrington,
Tilhill:
Tel: 07825 193278.
Email: simon.marrington@tilhill.com
Website: www.tilhill.com