Subsidy for solar farms ends in January

Farmers are to lose their right to claim subsidies for fields filled with solar panels under new government plans aimed at ensuring more agricultural land is dedicated to growing crops and food.

From January 2015, farmers who use fields for solar panels will not be eligible for any farm subsidy payments available through the Common Agricultural Policy, for that land.

Environment secretary, Elizabeth Truss, comments: “English farmland is some of the best in the world and I want to see it dedicated to growing quality food and crops.

“I do not want to see its productive potential wasted and its appearance blighted by solar farms. Farming is what our farms are for and it is what keeps our landscape beautiful.”

The subsidy change will also save up to £2 million of taxpayers’ money each year and follows a recent announcement that renewable energy subsidies for new large-scale solar farms will end next April.