The Source

The UK’s latest climate risk assessment, A Well-Adapted UK, has landed with a now-familiar and sobering reminder for those in agriculture and horticulture: the impacts are already here, the risks are escalating, and adaptation is no longer optional.

Following Mental Health Awareness Week, it feels especially important to continue the conversation around mental health within the agriculture industry.

The studies help neighbouring farmers explore and rank practical options for improving water supply resilience and securing reliable access to water for the future.

Removing the plough altogether can be very risky in a wet season, particularly on heavier soils – it relies on a history of gentle soil husbandry over five or more years, as well as a ‘good’ season…

The UK Farm Assurance Review calls on NFU and AHDB to lead work to clarify and reset the purpose and scope of farm assurance. This document responds to that recommendation

Over the course of evolution, plants have developed an elegant strategy to counteract a lack of phosphate in the soil—they form symbiotic relationships with soil fungi. These mycorrhizal fungi efficiently supply their plant partners with phosphate and other essential mineral

Chinese researchers improved pollination and fruit set in orchard crops by distributing bee-collected pollen with drones, combining biological and robotic approaches to address pollinator decline.

Biologicals could help agriculture become less dependent on chemical inputs. But their effectiveness differs from one plant variety to another: some respond well, while others barely respond. Research by Wageningen University & Research (WUR) suggests that genetic traits may determine how plants respond, helping breeders develop varieties that benefit more from biologicals.

Vaccination of laying hens against highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) reduces virus transmission, mortality and outbreak risks in the poultry sector. This was shown in a multi-year field study by Wageningen University & Research, conducted with Royal GD and Utrecht University, investigating two HVT-based H5 vaccines under Dutch commercial farming conditions.

The data tells a more nuanced story than the usual narrative. Succession is not being widely ignored, but nor is it being effectively completed. Most farms are somewhere in between, engaged, but unresolved. That gap between starting and finishing is where the real pressure sits. And in a sector facing ongoing change, that is the point that matters most.

In recent years, Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG) has moved from policy concept to practical reality. For many landowners, what initially appeared as an environmental compliance mechanism has quickly become a genuine commercial and strategic opportunity. However, the transition from theory to delivery is not always straightforward…

New research suggests that restoring ecological complexity, rather than trying to replicate historical conditions, may be a more effective way of building resilient ecosystems in a changing world.