Director, Head of Rural Research Savills Rural. Lincolnshire Farming Conference Chair 2023 & 2024
The main take away from the Scottish Land & Estates Conference yesterday was that ‘less strategy and more doing’ was required for rural Scotland. Governments need to provide leadership for regulatory direction, with solutions coming from industry. Anas Sarwar MSP confirmed this stating the role of government was 3-fold; 1. Collaboration and partnership working 2. Develop strategic long term planning 3. Provide the ‘convening’ power The theme of the conference, Resilience: Building successful businesses for the future attracted thought provoking speakers and the case study and panel sessions were inspiring. There is a raft of policy currently swirling all of which need the ‘so what’ answering. The integration between food production and the environment was cemented - Vicki Swales said “without nature land based businesses are threatened” and regenerative agriculture was mentioned a number of times - ties in well with Savills Rural Reseach Food and the Environment spotlight due out early June. Tim Bradshaw highlighted 3 key takeaways to build personal resilience: 1. Focus on intelligence not information. Take a tactical pause! 2. Enable resilience in others - it only takes a human touch to make a huge difference 3. FEAR = false expectation appearing real I.e focus on what you can do Sarah-Jane Laing summed up the day “words aren’t enough, we need direct action”. Evelyn Channing Hugo Struthers Lucy Jenner