The Sustainable Farming Incentive’s second application window of the year was gone within six hours. The argument about who missed out, and who should carry the cost, is proving much harder to close. In the days after the 22 September scramble, farmers on The Farming Forum compared notes on failed applications, agents who could not deliver, and what a fairer process would look like. The answers matter to every adviser, agent and software firm selling its time around these schemes.
By TFF News | 27 September 2026 | Business
The conversation, started as a poll asking simply who missed out, drew 102 visible contributions and 3,942 views on The Farming Forum between 22 and 26 September 2026, collecting 171 reactions at an average of 1.68 per contribution. The tone was heavily critical: 53 contributions were negative against 3 positive. These figures describe one conversation among the forum’s members and are not a representative survey of the sector.
Misses that were not marginal
The strongest reaction in the conversation went to a contribution setting out who the process left behind. “I have to say it is grossly unfair on all those who had tb testing, a family emergency, working a day job, those who’s application was still sat in a pile of 60 that a land agent was furiously working though”, it began.
One arable business with just over 300 hectares in an existing SFI 2023 agreement reported missing the deadline by 15 minutes after repeated system errors. Another contributor shared the Game and Wildlife Conservation Trust’s own published account of the day: “Even the GWCT at Loddington didn’t get in.”
One contributor pushed back, noting that by their maths more of those voting in the poll got in than did not: “In any other sphere, ask those charged with applying for grants if they would be happy with a 50% chance of success and they would bite your hand off.”
Agents on the hook
The sharpest strand for the trade was agents who took on applications and could not submit them in time. “Agent failed to do half the applications they had, mine included.” That contributor had switched to an agent after failing in the first window. The verdict on any invoice was blunt: “Be a row if they send a bill….”
It was not an isolated account. “Not the only one .Agent locked out with two hours to go !loads not done !” The billing question was put directly: “What happened if you got an agent to prepare it but it didn’t get in…? Still charged by agent?” One answer predicted the market would sort it: “Because if they want to send an invoice for work to date knowing you are not signed up, are only going to in effect cut their own throat.”
An agent in the conversation, locked out of the Rural Payments portal for ninety minutes mid-morning, still got every client application in, but not happily. “My main rant is the lack of communications about the opening time. I know of many farmers (and agents) who stayed up until midnight and then woke up a few times overnight in case the system opened.”
The digital divide
Underneath sat a harder question: who can realistically compete in a speed-based application race? “Probably because we are at an age where we wernt brought up with computers/technology and although some things can be managed we find it difficult to do such things”, one contributor explained, on why farm businesses pay agents at all. Another saw a legal dimension: “Interestingly that raises genuine questions over accessibility and potential discrimination….” At the other end of the capability scale came a prediction for the next round: “Everyone will be lined up with AI models making the application. What a farce.”
Exceptions, callbacks and 12,200 applications
Defra’s farming blog update of 23 September put Window 2 at around 12,200 applications, an average agreement value of roughly £20,700, and confirmed applications are processed in the order they arrived. Two exception groups can still continue: farmers needing assisted digital support, and those prevented by a technical issue with the service who reported it before the deadline. The Rural Payments Agency will contact everyone who started but did not submit, and that process was already visible: “I’ve already seen someone has had a silent callback from DEFRA and apparently they have now called back everyone who requested a callback.”
The same update carries the figure that frames the next round: more than 8,800 farmers have environmental land management agreements expiring by February 2027. Farmers Guardian reports the farming minister saying lessons will be learnt from this year to help shape SFI27, and Defra says it is exploring alternatives to a first come, first served application process.
The cap fight starts early
Contributors moved straight to how the next scheme should ration money. SFI26’s published rules cap each business at a £100,000 maximum agreement value per year. Some want that cut hard: “If it’s for countrywide environment gain then there should be a cap of £50k so that the whole country benefits.” Others argued a flat cap punishes scale: “Surely a per hectare cap is more sensible to spread the options around the countryside?” A low flat cap, the same contributor warned, forces “small farmers to become park keepers” while larger farms carry production.
Where has the money gone
Behind the rationing debate sat a budget argument. One contributor cited government statistics: “According to gov statistics, £910m was paid out in SFI in 2025”, asking how this year’s far smaller windows square with agreements expiring from next year. Another argued the pot shrank when Britain left the Common Agricultural Policy: “The £3bn of BPS money the RPA distibuted on behalf of the EU was never replaced by allocating some of the money we no longer pay into the EU”. That reading was contested in the conversation itself: “So it’s not that it wasn’t known, it’s now the reality of that is hitting home.”
The government’s published position, set out at the 2025 spending review, is that more than £2.7 billion a year goes into sustainable farming and nature recovery from 2026 to 2029, with environmental land management payments rising to £2 billion by 2028/29.
What the trade is left watching
Those still inside agreements that run into next spring expect to collide with the missed in the same queue for SFI27. Others are heading the other way. One contributor whose agreement ends in December put the appeal of leaving schemes and assurance behind plainly: “At the same time, come 1st Jan I will be free of the DEFRA yoke and potentially the Red Tractor yoke, so a pleasing year of zero paperwork.”
If SFI27 keeps any element of first come, first served, the premium on agent capacity, application software and opening-day readiness gets larger, and so does the accountability question when a hired firm misses the moment. If Defra changes the allocation model, the businesses that sell speed will need a new pitch. Either way, thousands of farm businesses now sit between an expiring agreement and an uncertain next window, and their willingness to stay inside voluntary schemes should not be taken for granted.
Read the source conversation and analysis
Read the full conversation on The Farming Forum here.
Download the full conversation analysis as a PDF slide deck: Who missed out? Conversation analysis.
This conversation had been viewed 6,970 times on The Farming Forum when counted on 1 October 2026. Want your brand in the room when farmers talk business? Book advertising with Agri Web Media.