Reaching 30by30 will be challenging but with continued efforts longer term nature targets are achievable
Another year and another report by the Office for Environmental Protection (OEP) on the annual progress of the Environmental Improvement Plan (EIP). This one is for 2024/25 and will be the last on the current EIP because the government reviewed the EIP in 2025.
National Landscapes Association Nature Recovery Lead Bruce Winney dives into the detail.
The best place to start is with a side-by-side comparison of progress over the last two reports using table 1 from the 2023/24 report:
Table 1. The Office for Environmental Protection summary assessment of past trends, progress for the year 2023/2024 and overall prospects of meeting ambitions, Environment Act targets and other commitments of the 10 goal areas of the EIP23. With the results from 2024/25 added for comparison, edited to be presented in the same format as 2023/24.
So, overall, there is some improvement in the progress for 4 goals, no difference in the overall prospects and a worsening of past trends in 2 goals. Nothing dramatically different, leading to no change in the OEP’s key recommendations from the 2023/24 report:
- Get nature-friendly farming right
- Maximise the contribution of protected sites for nature
- Speed up action in the marine environment
- Set out clear mechanisms for reconciling competing demands for land and sea
- Develop a circular economy framework
- Mobilise investment at the scale needed
- Regulate more effectively
- Harness the support needed to achieve ambitions
All of these are relevant to National Landscapes and are recommendations that we support. Acting on them would help National Landscapes to work towards our vision of beautiful landscapes where people and nature thrive.
Nature Recovery – Goal 1: Thriving plants and wildlife
Given my role, I’m going to dive a bit deeper into the goal that is especially relevant to nature recovery. Again, the best way to start is to look at table 2.2 in the report:
Tabe 2 Thriving plants and wildlife - summary assessment of key trends
Once more there is little change from last year, with the only difference being an increase in area under agri-environment schemes, although bear in mind that this was before the Sustainable Finance Incentive (SFI) was temporarily closed in March 2025. Countryside Stewardship applications were also only open to invited participants. It remains to be seen if this trend continues in 2025/26.
The recent reinstatement of SFI and extension of Farming in Protected Landscapes (FiPL) are to be welcomed and should us help move in the right direction. The OEP estimates that 49-70% of farmed land is under agri-environment schemes, which sounds positive but they do need to be the right schemes and not all of those in place will be driving action on the ground (p218 of the OEP report).
Digging a bit more into these numbers, there is a bit more positive news in that new woodland is beginning to be planted at the rate that is needed to reach the 2050 woodland target, with 7,164ha in 2024/25 and a further 7,000ha planned for 2025/26. However, this is tempered by long term uncertainty over the Nature for Climate Fund that is funding most of this work. There is also a reduction of @13,000ha in the area of woodland that is sustainably managed.
Twenty of the 34 English National Landscapes already have more trees than the national target for 2050 (16.5% by area) and they have also seen a drop off in woodland management, although our data lags the OEP data by a year. This is concerning and indicates that when we get the figures for the Protected Landscapes Targets and Outcomes Framework for 2024/25, the situation will be worse. Good woodland management is a key priority for many National Landscapes, is important for contributing to biodiversity and is one of the easiest and most cost-effective ways to bring sites to a condition where they can contribute to 30by30 (30% of land and sea managed for nature by 2030).
When it comes to 30by30, the OEP highlighted that the pathway to delivery is still in development (and this is also the case with the other UK nations), which means that with only 4 years to go the chances of meeting the target seem very unlikely. To have any chance of getting close, work needs to be seriously scaled in a strategically coordinated way. On land, National Landscapes (and National Parks) are in a strong position to be the backbone of 30by30. We have estimated that to get 45% of protected landscape area meeting 30by30 criteria would cost something like £14bn over five years. Appropriate prioritisation of current funding schemes to the right places would go a long way to meeting this.
Overall, it is good news that there has been some progress on four of the EIP goals but disappointing that this progress has not made any impact on the overall prospects of meeting the targets. When we dig into the ‘Thriving plants and wildlife’ goal, the reasons become clear.
But we do know what is needed to get there. There may be too little time left to completely achieve 30by30 in the UK but that doesn’t mean we should give up. The closer we can get to the target, the more likely we are to achieve the rest of the targets for nature.
We are putting together a vision for National Landscapes in 2050 and nature is a big part of that. Give us long-term commitment to sufficient funding of National Landscape teams, strong guidance for the protected landscapes duty and we will be ambitious and play our part. And if the OEP’s recommendations are taken on board then we have a chance to approach 30by30 and reach the long-term targets.